For the past six years, Rahul Singh has been photographing wildlife around his home in Jalpaiguri, India.

He has taken candid photos with elephants, rhinos, deer, jackals and monkeys, but his real passion is the colorful birds that nest around his town.

Last August, he captured a moment that left him stunned.

Singh said: “I went to a place with ornamental banana bushes to take pictures of honeysucking birds. “Everything was going normally, when suddenly I was startled when I saw the red nectar sucking bird starting to bathe in the water in the banana flower petals.”

The morning drizzle has settled in the bowl-shaped red banana petals, and the 4-inch songbird won’t let it get lost on a hot day. After filling up with nectar, the crimson sunbird begins to use the petals as a bath. In all his years of bird watching, Singh had never seen anything like this before.

Singh said: “I was shocked to see this unusual behaviour. “I pressed the shutter button on my camera while the bird was bathing.”

Singh is happy to be in the right place at the right time to capture the fairy-tale moment. He then shared these images on Instagram, where thousands of people have been affected by them. “It’s really a once-in-a-lifetime moment,” Singh said. “It’s amazing how nature can surprise us.”