2012 Tour Narrative
For the umpteenth year in a row Tiger again topped the end of tour ‘Bird of the Trip’ poll – but this year it wasn’t by the huge margin that it has won by in the past, as it only just piped one of the very last additions to our bird list, Collared Grosbeak, by a meagre five points. Not that our Tiger encounter was a poor one, far from it, as we watched a huge male for well over quarter of an hour as he relaxed in the shade, no doubt after a hard session of deer stalking! It was a tremendously satisfying encounter, one that we all enjoyed. It was our only sighting of this magnificent beast at Ranthambhore, though a lucky few of us went on to see two more Tigers during our time in Corbett Park – a close range encounter from elephant-back and the other by people in the lead jeep only.
Ranthambhore wasn’t even our first port of call. The tour had started with an exciting drive (aren’t all drives in India exciting for one reason or another?) from Delhi south to Agra – a drive where we even managed to find several Sarus Cranes on route! In Agra we’d had an excellent guided tour around the spectacular Taj Mahal before heading on to our gorgeous modest-sized hotel close to the river. We had a boat ride on the river the following morning and were blessed with numerous truly outstanding encounters with perched and flying Indian Skimmers, two Black-bellied Terns, some superb Black Ibis, an eventually cooperative Brown Crake as well as numerous, close range encounters with both Gharial and Mugger Crocodiles! Gorgeous scenery, great weather, some excellent birds, a superb atmosphere and excellent food – what more, other than the ever elusive Gangetic Dolphin, could we have asked for?
Moving on, our next hotel was in Bharatpur and here, just as at Chambal, there was a Brown Hawk Owl in the garden! The Bagh (literally ‘The Garden’) also boasted a pair of remarkably confiding Indian Scops Owls! Not that our owl fest stopped there – inside Bharatpur sanctuary we’d see a magnificent Dusky Eagle Owl at its nest while at both Ranthambhore and Corbett we’d come across the equally impressive Brown Fish Owl on no less than three occasions. Several Asian Barred Owlets put on fine shows up at Nainital but the diminutive Collared Owlet was only heard and unfortunately never seen.
There was plenty of water and consequently lots to look at inside Bharatpur Sanctuary. Designated a UNESCO World Heritage site for the bird life it supports we were kept busy with new species coming thick and fast. Early on our first day a pair of Barred Buttonquail put on such a lengthy performance that we eventually had to walk away from them. A Siberian Rubythroat took a modest amount more effort, as did day-time roosting Large-tailed Nightjar but other park specialities such as Brooks’s Leaf Warbler and Yellow-footed Green Pigeons fell almost at the first attempt. As always there were also lots of raptors to look at with Oriental Honey-buzzard as well as Greater Spotted, Imperial and Steppe Eagles all putting in star appearances. Our second day in the Sanctuary couldn’t possibly be as good – but it came close with two Orange-headed and one Tickell’s Thrush, an Eastern Orphean and yet another Jungle Cat being among the many highlights.
We travelled from Bharatpur to Ranthambhore by train – our first of four such rail trips. Thanks in no small part to Rajveer it went well, as did all of the others, and we arrived in time for an afternoon game drive inside the Tiger Sanctuary. Painted Spurfowl, the park’s premier avian prize, fell at the first attempt, while other highlights during this and subsequent forays inside the park included Short-toed Snake Eagle, numerous greedy, hand feed-able Rufous Treepies than you could shake a stick at and an abundant array of Tiger prey items such as Spotted Deer, Nilgai, Sambar and Wild Boar. Another undoubted highlight was the exquisitely plumaged Painted Sandgrouse we watched at a drinking pool less than 100 metres from the front gate of our comfortable hotel. Oh and then there were the Indian Vultures over the magnificent fort…and, of course, the Greater Painted-snipe. Seeing the latter here meant that we needn’t have bothered visiting the septic canal that Rajveer had taken us to on the edge of Bharatpur city! But then we weren’t to know that…
We were lucky to see the previously mentioned Tiger quite early in our time at Ranthambhore and this freed us up to take an afternoon ‘off’ and explore areas away from the park. Our Soorwal Dam excursion was great – not least for our first up close look at life in rural India and a fascinating insight into a Rajasthan village but also for the Dalmatian Pelicans, the Indian Coursers and the Yellow-wattled Lapwings that it yielded.
A train ride back to the capital went smoothly – but the same can’t be said about Delhi’s traffic and we arrived there just in time for a hasty evening meal in a thief’s restaurant before heading on to another station for the first of our two overnight sleepers. Waking refreshed (well some of us did) we met our enthusiastic jeep drivers and headed off to begin our exploration of the area around Corbett Park in the plains close to the base of the Himalayas. New birds came thick and fast (faster than breakfast) with Oriental Pied Hornbill, Red Junglefowl, and no less than five species of woodpecker (including Greater Flameback and White-naped Woodpecker) being added to our already burgeoning list before we reached our next hotel.
Our next port, a comfortable lodge outside Corbett Park, was several people’s favourite – as was the porridge that they served at breakfast on the lawn. Ornithological treats continued with our first Kalij Pheasants, Lesser Yellownape, Himalayan Flameback and our first party of talkative White-crested Laughingthrushes. However it was probably the Mountain Hawk Eagle, the Spotted Forktail and the Long-billed Thrush, three birds that were found by our drivers, as well as the diminutive Nepal Wren-babbler that made the biggest impression. And of course there was our first wild elephant – a belligerent beast that had been causing havoc in a tiny park edge village!
The following morning we took our jeeps into Corbett Park proper. Corbett Park’s a fantastic reserve full of exciting birds and majestic mammals. As always it’s difficult to single out highlights but the Otters, the swimming and snorkelling wild Elephant, the two Tigers, the Hog Deer as well as the Pallas’s and Lesser Fish Eagles, the Collared Falconet, Cinereous Vulture, Stork-billed Kingfishers not to mention the Chestnut-crowned Bush Warbler, Chaffinch, modest numbers of White-rumped Needletails and the Mallard will be long remembered.
After another large lunch we next headed up to the old hill station of Nainital – stopping for our first Red-billed Blue Magpies, Himalayan Treepies and Yellow-breasted Greenfinch on route. Thankfully the snow and cold weather that everyone had been warning us about never materialised and we spent our first early morning watching close range Black-headed Jays, Altai Accentors, Blue-fronted Redstarts and Spot-winged Tits to mention but a few. We were even treated to a respectable look at some of the towering snow-capped Himalayan Peaks towards the Nepalese and Chinese borders off to the east! After breakfast the morning’s birds were replaced by a confiding Upland Pipit, Slaty-headed Parakeets and Alpine Swifts while our impromptu lunch stop was where we stumbled across our first Red-billed Leiothrix and Ashy-throated Warbler. The second Chestnut-headed Tesia of the tour entertained us in the late afternoon.
An early start the following morning took us to an area deeper in the forest and grass clad mountains that surround Nainital and it was here where we spent time looking for Koklass and Cheer Pheasants. Unfortunately only the leaders clapped eyes on the former, Rajveer seeing one particularly well, but everyone enjoyed the Cheer Pheasant. Other goodies around Nainital included Scaly Thrush, Himalayan and Scaly-bellied Woodpeckers, two Goral, and a remarkably obliging Hill Partridge that was so close that it practically filled the telescope!
All too soon it was time to leave Nainital and head back to the tumult that is Delhi. Arriving in the early hours we had a short excursion to a nearby wetland - that produced impressive numbers of birds and even a new species, Tufted Duck, for the trip list.
Last year I finished the tour report off with the following paragraph ‘India’s undeniably an assault to the senses, all the senses. There certainly is abject poverty and considerable filth and yet the country’s full of happy, friendly people and is home to an enviable array of magnificent birds and mammals. Just how many of us left with fingers crossed that India’s wildlife will continue to survive…there are increasing signs of dramatic declines in the numbers of Tigers present in the reserves and their future and indeed the future of the entire country is far from certain…’ Things haven’t changed much since I wrote that, not yet… Paul Holt
Updated: February 2012