A Birding safari (with some extras) in the Western Ghats of Southern India

[janzin]

Oddly enough the genesis of the plan for this trip started in Svalbard, sitting around the dining table of the ship M.S. Freya, chatting with Vikram Singh, proprietor of Wild World India. I’d always wanted to bird the Western Ghats of India after seeing trip reports and videos from the major birding tour groups. But each time we went to India, somehow we had other priorities—like tigers   But now that we’d had three prior India trips under our belt, we felt ready to search out those endemic and near endemic birds of the Western Ghats---a long mountain chain that runs nearly the full length of the western Indian peninsula and is home to many endemic species and several only shared with Sri Lanka. Vikram said, let’s plan it when we get back!

 

So not too many weeks after our return from Svalbard I reconnected with Vikram and with a bit of back and forth, we worked out a plan. Even though tigers were not the priority of this trip, we couldn’t go to India without at least trying to see some! Encouraged by the many great reports of Kabini from @madaboutcheetah, we decided to preface the trip with several days in that park with hopes of tiger and even possibly the mysterious and famous “Blackie”, the melanistic leopard that resides there.

 

After much tweaking, we ended up with four nights in Kabini and the remaining nights at various birding hotspots in the Western Ghats, making our way south from Bangalore to Kochi. At Kabini we would avail ourselves of the lodge’s guide, and later we would be met by a dedicated birding guide and a driver for the continuation of our journey.

 

We had originally wanted to stay at KAAV in Kabini, on @madaboutcheetah's recommendation, but unfortunately they could not guarantee us a jeep safari for any consecutive dates that would work with our plan (more about the oddities of safaris in Kabini coming up.) So we upgraded to an even higher-end lodge, Evolve Back Kabini. More details on this later as well.

 

Here's the final itinerary.  Coming from New York City, we discovered there is no direct way to Bangalore without many flight changes, so we opted to take a non-stop to Delhi with an overnight there before continuing to Bangalore on an early afternoon flight. Then another overnight in Bangalore before the trip really got going. This worked very well as we were able to start the trip relatively rested.  As always, @Abhishek Sharma from WWI met us on arrival in Delhi and escorted us to our hotel, greeting us with a big hug and bringing us a stack of rupees for all our tipping and other needs. Another nice thing was since we had a free morning in Delhi, not only could we sleep in a bit, but Vikram came and met us for breakfast at our hotel, it was great to see him!

 

(BTW, I had added the altitudes here because I was curious about the temperatures and which areas would be hot and which cold. In the end, we had mostly lovely temps throughout, never very hot or too cold, even in Ooty, the highest area.)

 

Sat	11-Feb	AA Flight 292 departs JFK 8:00 pm
Sun	12-Feb	arrive in Delhi, 9:50 pm	Pride Plaza	https://www.pridehotel.com/pride-plaza-hotel-aerocity-new-delhi-hotel/
Mon	13-Feb	Vistara UK819 2:10, arrive bangalore 5:00	Taj bangalore	https://www.tajhotels.com/en-in/taj/taj-bangalore/
Tue	14-Feb	Kabini	Evolve Back (2300 ft)	https://www.evolveback.com/kabini/
Wed	15-Feb	Kabini	Evolve Back
Thurs	16-Feb	Kabini	Evolve Back
Fri	17-Feb	Kabini	Evolve Back
Sat	18-Feb	Masinagudi	Jungle Hut (3100 ft)	https://www.junglehut.in/
Sun	19-Feb	Masinagudi	Jungle Hut
Mon	20-Feb	Ooty	Accord Highland (7300ft)	https://www.theaccordhotels.com/property/accord-highland-ooty/
Tue	21-Feb	Valparai	Sirukundra Bungalow (3000 ft)	http://teabungalows.com/valparai-2/
Wed	22-Feb	Munnar	Olive Brook (5000ft)	http://olivebrookmunnar.com/
Thurs	23-Feb	Munnar	Olive Brook
Fri	24-Feb	Periyar	Spice Village (2800 Ft)	https://www.cghearth.com/spice-village
Sat	25-Feb	Periyar	Spice Village
Sun	26-Feb	Thattekkad	Hornbill Camp (sea level)	https://www.hornbillcamp.in/
Mon	27-Feb	Thattekkad	Hornbill Camp
Tue	28-Feb	Thattekkad to Kochi airport; Air Vistara UK 884 at 9:05/arr DEL 12:15	Day room Delhi Airport, flight home 11:55 pm AA 291
Wed	1-Mar	Arrive in JFK 6 a.m.

 

Before I continue, here’s a random photo for the opening slideshow. The lovely Indian Pitta, one of our most desired birds of the trip.

 

 

Edited May 18, 2023 by janzin

[janzin]

I will skip right to our arrival in Kabini/Nagarhole National Park, as the drive there was uneventful and I don’t recall much about it.

 

We arrived at Evolve Back in time for lunch (which was excellent—all the food there was great.) The lodge is set alongside the river, in lush grounds, and in fact, it is located on the other side of the river from where you board the safari vehicles, so you are boated over (about a 10 minute ride) for every safari. This does mean, however, that you have to leave extra time to get to the starting point. More on that in a bit.

 

Rooms are in individual cottages and while we had the least expensive class of room, we still had a private plunge pool and a wonderfully comfortable room with fully stocked (and free) minibar with snacks and soft drinks.

 

Some pics of the resort and our room.

 

Our welcome!

 

 

huge bathroom with a little garden outside. Very private.

 

Living room

 

Our plunge pool. We never used it though---during downtime after lunch I was usually wandering around shooting birds or resting.

 

The resort's infinity pool at the edge of the river. Never used that either and I never saw anyone in it (but every chalet had their own pool and the more pricey ones had larger, heated pools, not just the plunge pool we had.)

 

 

We happened to arrive on Valentine's Day so at dinner every table had this little chocolate plate.

Evolve Back was lovely all around and I would highly recommend it if you are staying in the area.

Edited May 18, 2023 by janzin

[Galana]

Excellent tease with the Pitta shot.

[Treepol]

Looking forward to this TR @janzin

[janzin]

I meant to include a map of our travels in post #1 for those who are not familiar with this area. (In fact I had no real concept of where anything was until I made the map. ) The numbers correspond roughly to where we stayed.

 

1. Bangalore

2. Kabini

3. Masinagudi

4. Ooty

5. Valparai

6. Munnar

7. Periyar

8. Thattekad

 

[michael-ibk]

Excellent, had been looking forward to this. Great shot of the Pitta. Really appreciate the map,since I’ve been thinking about a similiar trip for years now. 

[janzin]

2 hours ago, michael-ibk said:

Excellent, had been looking forward to this. Great shot of the Pitta. Really appreciate the map,since I’ve been thinking about a similiar trip for years now. 

When you are ready to plan it, make sure to consult with me! And I can't recommend our bird guide highly enough--Anoop Jacob. We'll get to him after the Kabini part

 

[michael-ibk]

Sure will - the problem with not quite top of the list destinations/ideas is they always get queued... queued... and queued. 🙂

[janzin]

Just now, michael-ibk said:

Sure will - the problem with not quite top of the list destinations/ideas is they always get queued... queued... and queued. 🙂

haha I know, I'm still waiting for you to be ready to try for Patagonia again

 

[michael-ibk]

We'll get there. Just saw some really awesome Puma photos yesterday and thought, wow, I need to do this. 😁

[janzin]

A bit about Kabini--

The actual name of the park is Nagarhole National Park and it is situated in part along the Kabini river, but seems to generally be called “Kabini.” There is also an adjacent national park, Bandipur, which lies just a bit south. Nagarhole is quite large and it claims to have one of the highest density of tigers of any Indian reserve, currently estimated at about 125.  But while it is quite large in area, this is a bit misleading because the tourism area that you can traverse is actually quite small. 

 

I will cut right to the chase and say that while we enjoyed our time at Kabini, we were disappointed in many of the aspects of the way the safaris are run. Reading the excellent report from @Atravelynn and @wilddog about their time there, it is as if they were in an entirely different place, almost an alternate universe. Of course we totally understand that wildlife viewing is in good part a matter of luck and our luck was just not very good; but there were many aspects of the park that we found frustrating.

 

Let’s get right to the first safari and I’ll try to explain the issues as we go along.

 

The timings for the safaris at Kabini are short—the afternoon from 3:30-6, morning from 6:30-9, only 2.5 hours. I suppose a slight disadvantage of Evolve Back is that because you need to take the boat across, you need extra time. You really need to be at your jeep ½ hour before “take-off” so that meant for the afternoon safari we “mustered” at 2:15: 15 minutes for preparing the guests (safety talk etc.) then down to the boat, and by the time everyone boarded and got their life jackets on etc, we would get to the jeep by 3ish. Still, the boat ride across was enjoyable, and at least for the afternoon there was a chance of seeing some birds.

 

We met our naturalist from Evolve Back, Sharath Abraham, who was fantastic; very knowledgeable; he knew we liked birds and was happy to stop for them; and did his best to help us with the craziness of the vehicle situation…..

 

We knew in advance that all vehicles are shared and we’d be with other people in the jeep. But we didn’t realize that it would always be a minimum of 8, and usually 9, (depending if you had a guide and driver or just a guide) crammed into the vehicle and that it would be a mix of people from different lodges. Most of the jeep seats here are laid out as a row of 3, then a row of 2, then another row of 3. Needless to say getting stuck in a row of a tight three with our large lenses made it nearly impossible to move, much less take photos. In order to get the 2 seat row, you more or less had to get to the vehicle first so it was a race every drive, but sometimes we lost the race, as there might be people from another lodge already sitting in the vehicle when we got there (in fact, they were usually from KAAV!)

 

Sharath really did his best to help us get the 2 seats— even before we boarded the boat he would give us the license number of the assigned gypsy so that we could run to it and (hopefully) get there first, but as I said, sometimes that just wasn’t quick enough. (I should add that in all our 8 drives we were the only ones with large lenses—most people were using cell phones or small bridge cameras, possibly due to the high camera fees, which I’ll get to later.)

 

So first safari we were lucky enough to get the two seats and we only had 8, and they were all from our lodge. Sharath was driving there and there was no additional naturalist, so someone could sit in the front next to him if they wanted, but this wasn’t optimal either as there is a windshield in front of you.

 

The first critter we saw was this elephant lumbering across the road. Of course, at the beginning of an afternoon safari the light is pretty harsh but this was the closest we came to an ellie so I'll include it.

 

 

And we were really excited to see our first Malabar Giant Squirrel. Little did we know that by the end of the trip we'd be calling it the "Squirrel safari" because we saw so many (and other types too.) But I get ahead of myself.

 

 

We saw some nice birds, like this very common White-throated Kingfisher.

 

 

And a Changeable Hawk-eagle (NOTE: the caption on the photo is incorrect but I don't see how I can replace the photo here. Thanks @Vikram Singhfor the correction!

 

 

And the first life bird for us, this gorgeous White-bellied Woodpecker. We were super lucky that he was foraging low down on a tree trunk, at eye level.

 

 

Many of you know I'm not a fan of monkeys, but here's the most common monkey of the area: Grey Langur--trying to look cute (not succeeding, IMHO

 

 

We came upon this Sambar deer which sported something I'd not seen before: the "sore spot", which both male and female Sambar get after rutting season--a bald patch on their necks which looks like its bleeding, although I've read that technically it's not. Interestingly, no one really seems to know the purpose of this spot (and I searched online to verify this.) It seems to be glandular, but no one seems to know.

 

Not a great photo as it was already quite late, but I think it's interesting enough to include.

 

 

The afternoon drive on the whole was fairly quiet but suddenly it got much more exciting. We came up to a waterhole and saw a Sloth bear foraging very close to it!

 

 

But wait...turns out there were two! A mother and a (fairly large) cub.

 

 

 

It was quite late by now, and not much light at all..most of these are around ISO 10,000.

 

 

 

 

Just as they started to get closer to the waterhole, another vehicle drove up and spooked them, and they turned and ran back into the forest. But we had to leave anyway as it was just about 6 now and time to head out. So for now we were happy and felt things were starting off promising!

Edited May 20, 2023 by janzin

[TonyQ]

A great start to your report. I look forward to following it and enjoying your photos.

[janzin]

There are two safari tourism zones in Kabini, A and B. These are assigned in the same mysterious way that they are assigned in any Indian park, seemingly at random. Some days we’d be in A for both morning and afternoon, some days divided. But both routes were rather short and neither was especially interesting in terms of habitat. The route in zone A travels through the forest and seemed somewhat better than Route B, as A has several waterholes (and the restrooms.) Zone A is where we saw the Sloth Bears.

 

Route B does pass by the river but only for a short stretch, and a long stretch of route B runs along the fence line with the villages right on the other side; we never saw anything in that section, and it only has one waterhole which is near that fence line.

 

Perhaps later in the season, when it’s hotter, there would be more activity at the waterholes, but in late February they were not active at all. Other than those first Sloth Bears I don't think we saw a single thing at the waterholes, not even a bird.

 

So now we are at day 2 and our first morning safari. Meet-up was at 5:15 to arrive at the starting point by 6. Since we are boating over in the dark, nothing to see. Judging by my photos, we were again in Zone A, but it was a very slow morning---until right at the end.

 

This Grey Langur was not any cuter than the first one. In fact, rather demonstrates why I don't like monkeys!

 

 

The Common Hawk-cuckoo was another life bird. One of those birds I got super excited to see...only to realize after a few days that they lived up to their name and were super common!

 

 

I really don't have any other photos from the morning until almost the end of the safari.  Suddenly in the road we spotted a group of four wild dogs, or Dholes.

 

 

 

 

They didn't stick around long and just ran off into the woods, but it made the morning!

 

Since I don't have many photos from that morning I will add a few birds that were taken back at the lodge, during the lunch break.  The lodge grounds were very birdy and that's why I never found time to use the pools

 

These are not all from the same day.  There was a flowering flame tree which attracted lots of birds.

 

 

 

 

This wagtail was hangin' by the infinity pool.

 

 

The Ashy Prinias were are so cute and jaunty with their tails!

 

 

 

 

Well, we still hadn't seen any cats. Maybe we'll get lucky in the afternoon?

 

 

Edited May 19, 2023 by janzin

[Galana]

Enjoying this a lot. It is bringing back memories from my own trip. Some good, some bad. Don't remember a river in Kabini. There was a lake for trips which I did not enjoy as pax stood up in front of us and blocked the view. Whilst we did share a car once, it was busy at Easter, we must have got lucky as the vehicles were quite small. We also got chased by a lone female ellie. They are not the gentle giants of Africa.

Great encounter with the Dholes and superb bird shots..

[janzin]

2 hours ago, Galana said:

Enjoying this a lot. It is bringing back memories from my own trip. Some good, some bad. Don't remember a river in Kabini. There was a lake for trips which I did not enjoy as pax stood up in front of us and blocked the view. Whilst we did share a car once, it was busy at Easter, we must have got lucky as the vehicles were quite small. We also got chased by a lone female ellie. They are not the gentle giants of Africa.

Great encounter with the Dholes and superb bird shots..

 

It's definitely the Kabini river, but it does widen to what seems like a lake. You can do a boat "safari" trip in place of a jeep safari, and we were offered that for one of our rides, but we decided to stick with the jeep for a better chance at cats. Although sometimes tigers are seen from the boat.

 

Here is a map where you can actually see the location of Evolve Back, where we stayed, and where you get the jeeps, which is the government run lodge "Jungle Lodges and Resort." 

 

[wilddog]

what a great sighting of the sloth bear and cub.

and the Dohl.

Edited May 20, 2023 by wilddog

[janzin]

Afternoon safari:

 

I believe we were in Zone B this time. Again, I don't have many photos.

 

We came upon this elephant..there was also a calf but they were actually too close and I only had my 500mm lens.

 

 

This is a good place to mention the very high camera fees at Kabini--the most we've seen in any Indian park.   1500 rupees—about $18—per safari for any camera with a lens over 200mm. For this reason we each only took one camera with one lens into the park (normally on safari I have two cameras, one with a shorter zoom lens. This would have been impossible anyway in this crowded vehicle, definitely no room to juggle two camera bodies.) So for 8 safaris we paid almost $300 in camera fees; which I wouldn’t have minded so much except that there were some drives where we literally took no photos, or very few.

 

We spent a little time with the ellies and after that, I don't think we saw much.

 

Another nicely posed kingfisher.

 

 

We did find a pair of Malabar Trogons which was very exciting for us (life birds!) but they were too distant and too much in the foliage for decent photos. Even Sharath was excited as he said they are not common in the park. I took some record shots, not worth posting here, but no worries as we had much better opportunities later.

 

Finally, at once again nearly the end of the drive, Sharath spotted a cat! Not a tiger, but a spotted cat--a leopard! He was just laying calmly in the leaves.

 

 

We waited with him awhile but he didn't seem inclined to move. And soon enough, it was time to go back.

 

BTW, we had asked about Blackie--the famed melanistic leopard.  Sharath told us that he hadn't been seen in the tourism area in many months, in fact the last time was August. But rangers knew he was still in the park, somewhere beyond the tourist area. So there was little chance of seeing him

 

 

 

 

[janzin]

Next morning--I don't recall which zone, I don't have enough photos to figure it out! (I can usually tell by whether there's anything by the water--if so it has to be Zone B.)

 

Anyway, it wasn't long before we came upon this big male leopard just walking through the trees. I am not sure it was the same leopard as the day before, that one never got up so couldn't quite tell if it was male or female.

 

 

He just kept walking and soon was out of sight in the woods, but a beautiful spotted cat and a nice way to start the day! We had high hopes!

 

But alas the rest of the morning again was very slow.

 

An Indian Roller.

 

 

And another Malabar Giant Squirrel.

 

 

That was pretty much it, so I'll post a few more birds from around the lodge, taken over lunchtime.

 

Ashy Drongo

 

 

Coppersmith Barbet. Usually hard to photograph as they are up high but this one was feeding on the fruits of this tree, almost eye level.

 

 

Drab but cute Asian Brown Flycatcher (very common everywhere.)

 

 

Red-whiskered Bulbul

 

 

 

[michael-ibk]

Great Leopard sightings and beautiful birds!

[janzin]

Heading down to the boat for our afternoon safari, I lingered a moment to take a few photos of the Small Pratincoles which were feeding in the grassy area along the riverfront. The light was very harsh but they are pretty birds, although not lifers for us (we'd seen them in Corbett and I think Gujarat too.)

 

 

Although the boat doesn't slow down I knew from the prior day that we'd pass a colony of cormorants nesting, and was able to grab a few shots as we sailed by. I think there might have been a mix of cormorant species but most were Great Cormorants.

 

 

 

 

This afternoon we were definitely in Zone B. 

 

There were some elephants along the river. Again, the light in the mid-afternoon was not really conducive to good photography.

 

 

 

Heading back into the forest, eagle-eyed Sharath spotted this monitor lizard sticking out of a hole in a tree.

 

 

We passed through the area (at least I think it was the same area) where we'd spotted the Malabar Trogons the prior day, and sure enough they were still around. This time, a bit closer and I was able to get a photograph. Although we'd have even better looks much later in the trip.

 

 

Still, no tigers...

 

But wait.....again, at the very end of the day something stripey was spotted!

 

 

Could this be the worst look at a tiger ever?  It's pretty bad, and didn't get much better...

 

 

But Sharath knew where he might be going...down to the river.  We headed to the spot where Sharath thought he'd emerge...and he did! But really quite far away.

 

 

Well, this isn't very satisfying, but at least it proves there's tigers here.

 

Eventually he had his fill of drink and started heading back to the forest, but still very far away.

 

 

There was almost no light and these are cropped quite a bit too.

 

 

 

 

 

Probably my worst tiger photos ever (and they are only for this trip report, I'd never post them on Facebook much less my website!) But it gave us hope that we might do better. There was still three more safaris to go.

 

 

Edited May 20, 2023 by janzin

[Galana]

17 hours ago, janzin said:

Here is a map where you can actually see the location of Evolve Back, where we stayed, and where you get the jeeps, which is the government run lodge "Jungle Lodges and Resort." 

Ah.A bit clearer.so hat lake was actually a river? Who knew?

"We" were just over the river at Jungle Lodges and did most of our drives by road from there. That is where I got my "Bus stop tiger".

Love your leopards.

Edit.

Nice Trogon and good tiger too.

That is exactly where we got 'our' tiger on the one boat trip on the Lake/River.

Edited May 20, 2023 by Galana
added text.

[janzin]

13 minutes ago, Galana said:

.

That is exactly where we got 'our' tiger on the one boat trip on the Lake/River.

Ah yes I remember your report now and the "bus stop" tiger!

[AKR1]

Some stunning shots, Janet. The leopard(s) and monitor lizard in particular caught my eye. Sorry the tigers were so elusive for you this time - obviously there in numbers given recent reports but luck and the Kabini restrictions were evidently a headwind. However the rest of what you saw- a plethora of birds and elephants, leopards etc were a good consolidation- and you are still early in this report so sure there’s lots more. Your photographs as everyone knows, are always exceptional. 

[janzin]

1 hour ago, AKR1 said:

Some stunning shots, Janet. The leopard(s) and monitor lizard in particular caught my eye. Sorry the tigers were so elusive for you this time - obviously there in numbers given recent reports but luck and the Kabini restrictions were evidently a headwind. However the rest of what you saw- a plethora of birds and elephants, leopards etc were a good consolidation- and you are still early in this report so sure there’s lots more. Your photographs as everyone knows, are always exceptional. 

Thanks! Yes, the birds will really start coming in earnest once we leave Kabini. And the squirrels

[janzin]

That night we returned to our room after dinner to find this:

 

 

and this!

 

 

The only thing was...it wasn't my birthday!   Actually my birthday was a couple of days later, but I guess Wild World India decided that I'd have a better celebration here than at our next lodging. So thoughtful of them...and the cake was delicious! It lasted two days, luckily we had a mini fridge in the room.

 

Okay, on to the next morning's safari. We awoke to a very dense fog, which didn't bode well. And indeed, it was (once again) a very slow morning.

 

We saw some Gaur as the fog thinned a bit. You can see he's actually wet.

 

 

And at one point, one of the people in the vehicle swore they saw a tiger. Sharath also thought he saw a tail... But the fog was so thick no one else saw anything.

 

Eventually the fog lifted, but the morning didn't bring anything more than a few birds.

 

Here's another Common Hawk-cuckoo.

 

 

And a chicken (actually, a native Grey Junglefowl.)

 

 

We actually didn't see all that many chital (Spotted Deer) here. Maybe that's why the tigers were so scarce?

 

 

We watched a Little Egret fish for awhile, so I guess we were in Zone B.

 

 

The afternoon safari was also in Zone B and sad to say, it wasn't much more active. 

 

But wait...we DID see a tiger!

 

Can you find him?

 

 

Good eyes if you can. Now THAT'S the worst tiger photo ever!

 

We waited a short while to see if he'd move, but Sharath said there was no point waiting around because he (or she, who could tell?!) was fast asleep and there were no roads near where it was, no way to get closer. Sigh.

 

I literally have no other photos from that afternoon, and I think that was one of the times we were squished in a row of three, so couldn't really even shoot birds.  So now we just have one morning safari left.