Thilaka V. WIJEYARATNAM

In a cosy cove nestling comfortably, slumbers the little town of Gosford, in Sydney, Australia. Suddenly at 3.15 p.m. it comes to life, for it's the time for Pelican feeding. Of Pelicans said a poet: "Pelicane's beak can hold more than its belly can."

Quite true. The long beaked birds with a pouch, like biological clocks come to a certain spot exactly at 3.30 pm. An organisation thought of attracting Pelicans by offering them a feast of fish. Steps are built along the site for spectators to watch this performance.

Around 3.15 p.m., the Pelicans start coming in one by one, then in groups. Some wait at a safe distance to see how things are going before they saunter in. Come these delightful creatures with wings spread and limbs together they glide gracefully through the air and land elegantly on the surface of the water and then do a little surf-riding so like an expert - for a distance, do a sharp turn and come to the feeding spot. While watching this refined performance one cannot help but think of the vibrant ballerina Dame Margot Fontayne or the Russian Ballerina Vlanova of Swanlake fame - only there is not one ballerina but a whole bunch of them

So elite, so elegant, so graceful, so remarkably majestic, so dignified and so very dazzling they are. Once they climb the dais four they are fed so orderly standing in rows anxiously waiting for the organisation member to toss the fish. One by one as the fish is tossed up, snatch it with the long painted beak and move out for the others turn. But one adjutant bird, could be a leader or a bully, after having had his catch went back to the last row for a second helping. How very human, I thought. About two years before I went with a socio-religious group to Mutur to distribute some items, the Tsunami refugees wanted kerosene cookers and hurricane lamps. We distributed each to each tent.

In the process we noticed

one refugee in more than one tent not only for a second helping but many helpings - wouldn't dare say how pelican like!

The organisation member really has a sense of humour she would hold the fish up and asking "Do you want fish?" swing it up and down - up and down the heads of the pelicans would go in turn with the hand movement.

It was very entertaining. The beautiful sight of the birds gliding in, surfing, straddling on the steps and catching and pulping the fish will ever be etched on one's memory.

A guide for butterflies in Sinhala

Sri Lanka is one of the top bio-diversity countries in the world. Quite sadly, however, only a few works on the subject have been authored in Sinhala. Environment entered the school curriculum as a subject in 1976 for the first time. This period witnessed two major publications on butterflies in Sinhala: Lakshman Weeratunga's Sri Lanka Samanala Namayan and Douglas B Ranasinghe's Samanala Sanrakshana.

One reason for Ranasinghe's interest in contributing to butterfly literature is his own experience in the field: students did not have a proper command of butterflies. Many woks are published in English, priced at exorbitant rates.

Asirimath Samanala Lokaya is the latest of Ranasinghe's painstaking efforts to introduce the scientific background knowledge on butterflies in Sinhala. Ranasinghe is helped by Dr. Michael Vanderpooten and Lakshman Weeratunga for the task.

The book is comprised of 11 chapters explaining the introduction of butterflies, interrelationship with trees, interrelationship with other insects, enemy management, mating, migrating, interesting information, endemic species and maintaining a butterfly garden.

Although it is written in Sinhala, Ranasinghe provides technical and scientific terms within brackets along with a bibliography for anybody to pursue any interesting sub area. The book has a list of colourful images of butterflies as well.

Ranasinghe is currently the president of Wildlife and Nature Protection Society with 15 publications to his credit. He was honoured with a Presidential award for environment recently.