END OF THE EIGHT YEAR ITCH: The wait was finally over! Amid vibrant hues of green was a curtain of lavender speckled with a rouge of pink. After eight long years, the Karvi shrub, Strobilanthes callosus, was blooming en masse in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park among many other locations in the Western Ghats, and pollinators like this honeybee were making the most of this abundance of nectar that lasts only for around two months. The image was shot in the Nagla block of SGNP in the monsoon months.