Satpura Tiger Reserve, an underrated gem

[Soukous]

Satpura Tiger Reserve

Satpura National Park is located in the Satpura Range of Hoshangabad district in Madhya Pradesh.
The Tiger reserve encompasses an area of 1427kmsq and was formed by the joining together of 3 wildlife sanctuaries, Satpura, Pachmarhi and Bori. Each of the original sanctuaries had quite different terrain so the national park offers very diverse habitats with deep valleys, sandstone peaks, narrow gorges, rivulets, waterfalls, thickly dense green forest of Sal and other medicinal herbs and Tawa vast reservoir.
Altitudes range from 290m to 1400 m. The highest peak in the park is Dhoopgarh at 1400 m.

Although the core Tiger reserve is 1427km sq, when you add on the buffer zone that surrounds it, the park covers an area of about 4500km sq.

 

 

The people travelling with me in Satpura were all regular Africa visitors and we all commented how much the Satpura landscapes resembled Matopos NP in Zimbabwe.

 

The Denwa River is a lifeline for Satpura National Park. Originating from the south-eastern part of the Hoshangabad district in Madhya Pradesh it flows from east to west before joining the Tawa river at south of Rainpur.
At the confluence of Tawa & Denwa river, Tawa dam has been constructed. The Tawa reservoir gives visitors to Satpura the opportunity to do activities not available in other parks, such as boat trips and canoeing.

 

As with most Indian wildlife reserves, only a small portion of the park is open to tourist traffic.
 

Satpura National Park is very rich in bio-diversity.

Fauna species include: Spotted Dear, Indian Bison(Gaur), Tigers, Leopards, Wild boar, Wild dog (locally called Dholes), Sloth bear, Black buck (unique attraction), Porcupine, Sambhar, four Horned antelopes (Chowsingha), Smooth otter, Pangolin, Marsh crocodile and Langurs. One of the rarer species found in Satpura is Indian Giant squirrel.

In terms of sightings, Leopards, Gaurs, Wild Dog and Sloth Bear are seen more frequently than in other parks. Tigers are sometimes more elusive, but the population is thought to be around 50 individuals.

If you are only interested in tigers, then Satpura is probably not the best park to visit. But if you want to see leopards, sloth bears and giant squirrels it is amongst the best.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bird-watching in Satpura National Park is outstanding, with a huge variety of forest and shore birds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Getting to Satpura

Although Satpura is accessible by road and rail, the simplest way to get there is to fly into Bhopal, about 200km from Satpura. The flight time from Delhi to Bhopal is about 1 hour.From there it is approximately a 4 hour drive.

 

If you are travelling onwards from Satpura, Pench Tiger Reserve can be reached in about 4 hours on a very good & scenic road.

 

Bhopal is not at all what you’d expect. When you mention Bhopal, the first thing that springs into most people’s minds is the industrial incident at the Union Carbide plant in 1984, when a gas leak affected around 500,000 people.

Bhopal today is actually quite a green city and seems uncrowded by Indian standards. Their choice of the slogan ‘City of Lakes’ is a little unfortunate as it is too easily amended to ‘City of Leaks’. (Yes, I know. My humour has never been politically correct.)

 

Bhimbetka Rock Shelters

About an hour’s drive outside Bhopal, on the way to Satpura, are the Bhimbetka Rock Shelters, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Here there are around 700 rock shelters spread over a 10km sq site, where has been found traces of human habitation (homo erectus) dating back 100,000 years. Some of the shelters feature cave paintings that are 30,000 years old.

I found the location and the rock art very reminiscent of sites I'd visited on the Mitchell Plateau in Australia.

 

 

 

 

 

Where to stay

Although there are a fair number of places to stay around Satpura, in my opinion only 3 of them are worth considering.

This is because of 2 key factors: the accommodation itself and the quality of the naturalists at the lodges. Naturalist (no Dear don’t get excited, I said naturalist, not naturist) is the term used in India for the guides that accompany you on game drives and walks.

 

The 3 places I’d recommend are: Forsyth Lodge, Reni Pani and Denwa Backwater Escape.

I’d rate Forsyth Lodge as the best, although Reni Pani is the most expensive. Denwa is an acceptable fall back option but only if I could not get space in the other 2.

 

Game drives & walks

The diverse terrain and the Tawa Reservoir give Satpura an edge over other parks where the only option is game drives by jeep.

It is one of the few parks where you can walk inside the park itself and for birders this is a huge boon.

 

what it is usually like

 

what it is like at the moment

 

Under normal circumstances taking a boat or canoe onto the water is a great way to see bird life and crocodiles. In 2018, the waters were very low indeed due to poor rainfall in 2017. A combination of the need for water to irrigate farms upstream and water being let out through the Tawa dam for hydro power created a situation where for the first time ever you could walk across the river into the park; usually this involves a short boat trip.

 

Wildlife viewing activities are as follows:

 

• Game drives by jeep – available in morning and late afternoon

• Dusk Drive – These take place in the buffer area, not the core reserve. You still need a Forest Guide to accompany you but you can stay out until around 8pm. This is very useful when looking for species like Leopard, Sloth Bear and Tiger which tend to become active around dusk.

• Full day game drive – Essentially this is a morning and an afternoon drive, but instead of returning to your lodge you remain in the park. However, between 11am and 3pm you cannot drive around, but must remain at the Government Rest House at Churna. The big advantage of doing this is that you get to venture beyond the main tourist zone and will hardly see any other vehicles or tourists for the entire day. The rest house at Churna is located by a stream and the birdlife there is excellent.

 

All jeep based activities must be booked in advance as only a limited number of jeeps are allowed into the park each day.

The way it works is that you leave your lodge accompanied by your naturalist. He drives you to the park entry point. Here you pick up a Forest Department Guide. You then cross over the river into the park (by boat or on foot) and meet up with your vehicle and driver.
 

The jeeps being used in the park were actually donated by the three lodges I listed earlier. The original intention when they donated them was to have their own vehicles located inside the park which would be driven by their own naturalists. The Forest Department saw an opportunity to create more employment and increase their control and decided that only their own drivers could be used.

Note: All National Parks in India come under the jurisdiction of the Forest Department.

 

Apart from the fact that you now have 2 extra people in your jeep, the main disadvantage of this system is that responsibility for maintaining the jeeps lies with the Forest Department. So whilst the jeeps looked after by your lodge will be well maintained, the ones used inside the park are not so well looked after.

 

• Game Walks – Walks can be done both inside the park itself or within the buffer zone. A Forest Guide must accompany all tourists who are walking, whether inside the reserve or in the buffer area.

• Canoeing – When water levels allow.

 

The drives and walks that we did were all enjoyable and we saw an excellent diversity of species.

 

Other Stuff

Human – Wildlife Conflict

As with all places where wildlife and humans come into contact, there is some friction. The buffer area around each Tiger Reserve is intended to assuage this.

There is in place a government compensation scheme to pay farmers and villagers for any livestock lost to predators. This makes sense, but as with many things in India it gets bogged down in bureaucracy and the compensation payments can take a long time to come through.

What the 3 lodges have done (it is always the same 3 lodges as they are really the only ones run on a professional basis to an international standard) is to fast track the compensation. If livestock is lost they pay compensation immediately to the farmer and then when he finally gets his payment from the government scheme he reimburses the lodges.

 

Graft

On more than one occasion we witnessed situations where local bigwigs used their position to extort free services from the lodges.

 

We came back from a game drive one evening to find 3 police cars at the lodge, and a number of officers in their finest uniforms. It turned out that the local police chief had decided that he wanted to come and stay at the lodge. He turned up with his family and demanded accommodation. Of course he was not going to pay.

I asked them why they tolerated this and they said that if they refused him he could make their lives very difficult indeed, just by delaying licences & permits and by carrying out inspections designed to cause disruption to the running of the lodge.

 

On another occasion we were told that we could not use a government guest house for our lunch stop – except the toilets – because some local big nob was coming for lunch. We were in the area for over 3 hours and he just turned up when we were getting ready to leave.

 

Tiger Obsession

One thing you need to get used to when visiting wildlife reserves in India is that Indian tourists will outnumber international visitors by 20 or 30 to 1, probably even more.

And the only thing that most of them want to see is a tiger. So they congregate at any place where a tiger has been sighted or is likely to be sighted. They all talk no-stop so that it sounds like a market place and then they are urging their drivers to move back & forth to get a better position.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 13, 2018 by Soukous

[Botswanadreams]

@Soukous I can agree that Satpura for us was one of the finest parks in India we visited recently. The family character with only 12 cars per drive in the core area was very special compert with the other Tiger Reserves in central India. The landscape and the sightings gave us more than expected.   

 

On 13.4.2018 at 0:57 PM, Soukous said:

If you are travelling onwards from Satpura, Pench Tiger Reserve can be reached in about 4 hours on a very good & scenic road.

This is more than optimistic. Let's say 5 to 6 hours than you reach your destination.  

 

On 13.4.2018 at 0:57 PM, Soukous said:

Denwa is an acceptable fall back option but only if I could not get space in the other 2.

I can't agree with this. We were in Denwa and it was all perfect - the whole place, the rooms, the service offert from all staff members and the foot was the best we had in India over our two month. We were accompanied on all game drives by the head guide from Satpura and he was excellent. Other guest went on the drives with the manager of Denwa and were very happy too. I don't know the other mentioned lodges but I can say Denwa is a very good choice for Satpura. 

Edited April 15, 2018 by Botswanadreams

[Soukous]

18 hours ago, Botswanadreams said:

I can't agree with this. We were in Denwa and it was all perfect - the whole place, the rooms, the service offert from all staff members and the foot was the best we had in India over our two month. We were accompanied on all game drives by the head guide from Satpura and he was excellent. Other guest went on the drives with the manager of Denwa and were very happy too. I don't know the other mentioned lodges but I can say Denwa is a very good choice for Satpura. 

 

Thanks for that info @Botswanadreams, I'm really pleased you enjoyed Denwa and rate it so highly. We must have been at Denwa on a bad day.

[madaboutcheetah]

@Soukous - fabulous report!!! I've heard so much about Satpura - just haven't ventured there yet ............ I heard about the good quality walking safaris on offer there? but wasn't sure how they do it - did you get a chance to try the walks?

 

Re Tiger sightings and Tiger obsessed Indians ...........  Not too different from the river crossings at the Mara, I'd suppose?  

 

 

[vikramghanekar]

NIce to see a Satpura report. Satpura has been one of my favourite parks. I used to visit the park every year (for 4 years on the trot) and I would always stay at Forsyth's. I haven't visited after Forsyth's Lodge changed hands and the old team left. I have had fabulous time driving, canoeing and walking in this park. When I visited the first time in 2010, there were just 2 lodges: Forsyth's (first season) and Reni Pani. I and my wife had a great time as there were hardly any restrictions in the park and there were hardly any tourists. We used to walk right from the entrance, accompanied by 2 female blackbucks ! Saw wild dogs on foot. Sloth bear and leopard sightings were plentiful on drives. Night drives were productive with civets, porcupines and of course leopards. 

It's a shame that there was no water in the dam because in winters this place is teeming with migratory water birds. Canoeing is a fabulous activity during this time of the year and one can get really close to birds and crocs. One of the best places to see Indian skimmers in action as well.

Denwa is part of Pugdundee safaris and I am no fan of this company. Not the most ethical operation around is the least I can say. 

[Atravelynn]

Blockbuster sightings!  Wow!  What month did you visit and for how many nights, @soukous?  Was Satpura part of a longer itinerary?  Very helpful lodging info.  Disappointing about the imposing dignitaries, but thanks for letting us know what happened.

[AfricIan]

Also (very) late to this one @Soukous but it certainly seems well worth considering

[Soukous]

On 5/9/2018 at 3:14 PM, madaboutcheetah said:

@Soukous - fabulous report!!! I've heard so much about Satpura - just haven't ventured there yet ............ I heard about the good quality walking safaris on offer there? but wasn't sure how they do it - did you get a chance to try the walks?

 

Re Tiger sightings and Tiger obsessed Indians ...........  Not too different from the river crossings at the Mara, I'd suppose?  

 

 

 

So sorry @madaboutcheetah, I completely missed your question.

Yes I did get a chance to do some walking. Basically you drive to the park entrance, as per normal; then cross the river. On the other side, instead of getting into a jeep, you start walking. 

It was a good mix of open country close to the river and waking in the forests. Not strenuous.

We had really good bird sightings but only saw a small number of mammals. It is definitely worthwhile.

Combined with the option to do canoe safaris as well it make Satpura quite different to other Indian parks.

 

RE: tiger sightings and tiger obsessed Indians - not so different at all, except for the noise level. At the Mara crossings people tend to talk to others in their own vehicle. My impression is that Indians talk a bit louder and are quite happy  to shout from one vehicle to another. 

[ice]

I'm not sure I would compare Mara River crossings with tiger sightings...I mean, there are like...what, half a dozen countries in Asia where in theory you can see tigers, the biggest part of any given year, in two dozen different parks / reserves ?! Compared to that, a river crossing in Kenya or Tanzania is what I'd call truly unique, something that cannot be observed anywhere else in the world, at least not in this magnitude.

[Soukous]

Just now, ice said:

I'm not sure I would compare Mara River crossings with tiger sightings...I mean, there are like...what, half a dozen countries in Asia where in theory you can see tigers, the biggest part of any given year, in two dozen different parks / reserves ?! Compared to that, a river crossing in Kenya or Tanzania is what I'd call truly unique, something that cannot be observed anywhere else in the world, at least not in this magnitude.

 

My understanding of the comment made by @madaboutcheetah was that It was intended more as a comment on the similarity of people's behaviour than a comparison of the events

[douglaswise]

@Soukous:

 

I would like to endorse all you wrote about Satpura.  A group of four of us visited in February 2018.  We also went to Tadoba and Pench.  We saw most tigers in Tadoba, but, otherwise, Satpura seemed to have most to offer, including night drives in the buffer zone.  We did glimpse a tiger in Satpura , but had good sightings of bear, leopard, nilgai and giant sqirrels.  Forsyth Lodge was our favourite of the three lodges we stayed at, but those outside Tadoba and Pench were also very good.  When we were there, low water levels meant boating wasn't possible.