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The gathering of Demoiselle Cranes at Khichan was, as always, one of the highlights of our journey across incredible India (Eric McCabe). All images in this report were taken during the tour by Mike Watson unless stated.

INDIA WILDLIFE SPECTACULAR19 FEBRUARY – 13 MARCH 2012

GUIDE: MIKE WATSON

GROUP MEMBERS: JOHN ANDERSON, ERICA DE’ATH, MIKE DEVERELL, GEOFF EINON, MARY GUY, ERIC McCABE, LESLEY McCABE, PHIL MUGRIDGE and MALCOLM WALPOLE

We began our third photo journey across the subcontinent in the western state of Gujurat, one of the world’s up and coming wildlife destinations, where the dusty teak forest of Gir was stalked by Asiatic Lions and leopards. Grey Wolves hunted herds of Blackbuck across the grasslands of Velavadar and we had some great moments with Wild Asses on the vast salt flats of the Little Rann of Kutch. Driving north into the colourful state of Rajasthan we paused to admire the golden city of Jaisalmer on our pil-grimage to Khichan and its unique gathering of Demoiselle Cranes. After a short flight east from Jodh-pur the main tour proper started in Delhi with a train journey south to Agra and its two world heritage sites, the Taj Mahal and Red Fort. Further south in Uttar Pradesh we visited the delightful Chambal Sanctuary, the last unpolluted major river in northern India, where we enjoyed our most productive session of the whole tour with wonderful encounters with Gharials, Indian Skimmers, Great Thick-knees, River Lapwings, Little Pratincoles and much more. Turning our attention to India’s famous Kipling Country we visited the tiger reserves of Bandhavgarh and Kanha, where we managed several good encounters with their main attraction, although the tigers were somewhat less obliging than on our previous tour the year before. It is mostly a question of what time in their breeding cycle you find them. When there are families of well-grown cubs then sightings abound. If not then it is harder work, as it probably ought to be. However, at least everyone managed some images, some of which were not bad at all. After saying goodbye to the homeward bound folks returning to Delhi a small band of us continued northeast to Assam and Kaziranga on the banks of the mighty Brahmaputra. There are

1 Wild Images: India Wildlife Spectacular 2012


Although they spend much of their time loafing around, the Asiatic Lions of Gir Forest are still a wonderful experience. Just think of all the thousands that once roamed from central India to the Balkans, these are the only ones left!

now literally thousands of mega herbivores (One-horned Rhinos, Asian Elephants and Wild Water Buffaloes) roaming the primeval grasslands here and they are impossible to miss. Fortunately the paint-throwing festival of Holi did us a favour by halting the annual grass burning for a while and the air quality was a bit better than usual, albeit still rather smoky. Finally a visit to a massive landfill site near Assam’s state capital, Guwahati, left a lasting memory of prehistoric-looking Greater Adjutant storks scavenging amongst gangs of children. These represent only a small handful of the many highlights of our travels in incredible India, surely the most fascinating country on earth. This is without question my favourite photo tour for lots of reasons!

The pre-tour extension to the third Wild Images ‘India Wildlife Spectacular’ photographic tour started in Mumbai, happily without incident this time. From here we flew to Rajkot in the Kathiawar Peninsula of Gujurat and, after a swift transfer, arrived at our comfortable base for the next couple of nights at Gir Forest National Park. One of the most important protected areas in Asia, this 1412 sq km national park holds the last remaining population of the Asiatic Lion, a subspecies, whose range once stretched from the Balkans to Central India. I mentioned last time that apparently when King Xerxes of Persia advanced through Macedonia in 480 BC, several of his baggage camels were killed by lions. Over the following centuries the lions were extirpated from almost their entire range as unwelcome predators but thanks to the considerable efforts of the Indian government forest department, their numbers at Gir have increased recently to 411 (at the time of the most recent census in 2010). This is a major conservation success story bearing in mind that at their nadir at the start of the 20th century the lions numbered only 15 individuals! When I was born, in the sixties, they had crept up to around 220.

Despite this improving trend the lions’ position is still precarious as they remain vulnerable to disease and also have a very small gene pool, which leaves their DNA profile looking like identical twins, hampers their reproduction and results in a high infant mortality rate. A captive breeding programme also exists to protect against these risks but this has not been without problems with haphazard hy-bridisation between Asiatic and African Lions in the past. The latest development in the lions’ future has been the inter-state supreme court wrangling between Gujurat and Madhya Pradesh (MP) over the latter’s plans to relocate some of the lions to one of its own national parks. Gujurat cite a limited

The big bad boss, Raju, enjoys a rest. His face even more battered than when we saw him on our previous visit a year ago.


prey base and poaching in MP as the reasons they do not want to lose their hegemony, although Gir is claimed to be reaching its carrying capacity, if not already and the lions were formerly found across northern Central India.

The dry deciduous teak forest at Gir presents a dusty landscape in February, with June’s monsoon-al rain still months away and hot midday temperatures set to rise further to well over 40 degrees celsius before the rains arrive. Despite being such large animals they can be difficult to find in the rather open forest but again we had no trouble at all in seeing lions this time, with a total of at least 26, although this had much to do with the fact that the park guards keep a constant tab on their movements. We also saw ‘Raju’ again, the dominant male I photographed last year and although the abcess under his right eye has now healed he has obviously been in the wars since with plenty of new scars on his battered face. The forest guards, who keep tabs on the lions’ movements are brave men indeed, armed with only puny quarter staffs and it is worth remembering that despite often giving the impression of being as docile as domestic cats the lions are still very dangerous animals, as was proved by their recent killing of two school children on their way home through the park, who had stupidly tried to photograph them with their mobile phones.

The forest is rich in wildlife and during our time here we also encountered: two Leopards, one seen leaping over a stone wall and away and another that drank from one of the park’s artificial water troughs before sloping off into the tangled shadows; Hanuman Langur; Eurasian Wild Boar and Sambar - the latter two are all on the lions’ menu. Birds included Red-naped Ibis, Oriental Hon-ey-buzzard and Indian Thick-knee, although our visit was only a couple of weeks later than last time and it was much drier. The pretty mango orchard in the grounds of our lodge again held the Indian endemic Marshall’s Iora and we retired to our chalets after dark to the roaring of a lion, passing by not far away! Raju himself has even been seen in the lodge grounds recently, gulp!

After a final lion safari at Gir we made the cross-country journey, past fields of coriander (being harvested this time), caster oil and cotton, to Blackbuck National Park, Velavadar near Bhavnagar, where, thanks to the speedy Toyota Innova transfer vehicles we were able to squeeze in an after-


Wildlife wonders of Velavadar (from top): Blackbuck; the nighty Nilgai (or Blue Bull); Grey Wolf and Jungle Cat.


noon safari. Velavadar was again teeming with wildlife, especially the elegant Blackbuck, the im-pressive males with their spiral horns, white spectacles and brown-and-white pied coats. They were simply everywhere, scattered across the extensive relict grassland. Their huge antelope cousins, the mighty Nilgai were also present in good numbers and very obliging as usual. The new Blackbuck Lodge is simply fantastic and is one of the best lodges on this circuit now. It is sure to become an instant favourite with tour companies, located a mere two minutes from the park gate. As well as the welcome luxurious accommodation our time here left us with some other great memories: the howl-ing of wolves heard from our chalets before dawn; lines of Common Cranes flying to their evening roost in the park and graceful Pallid Harriers floating through the lodge grounds in the morning. Al-though this was not a birding tour it was a shame to hear that harrier numbers are dramatically down at Velavadar this year but at least there were plenty to point the camera lens at, including some very obliging Montagu’s. Other photographic subjects here included: Black-winged Kites perched in the acacia-lined avenues; Jungle Cats (you need to be quick and/or lucky to catch anything more than a pair of ears disappearing into the grass with this one) and Grey Wolf (another one you need to be fortunate with, although our three vehicles tallied six sightings in a single morning – Velavadar is surely the most reliable place in the world to see this usually highly elusive creature?). A nearby wetland produced some distant sightings, that included both Great White and Dalmatian Pelicans, Greater Spotted Eagles as well as a host of waterbirds but unfortunately mostly out of DSLR range, owing to the low water level. Striped Hyena was also present in the park but eluded us this year and although Indian Eagle-owl was also present again, it turned its back on us the whole time and we dared not disturb it’s sleep. Our local guide Manisha told us that the lions are now only some 30km from Velavadar – one wonders how long it will take them to find Gujurat’s herbivore McDonalds?

Heading north we made much quicker progress than last year, with no massive Hindu festival, hel-icoptered gurus or one million motorized rickshaws to contend with. A brief stop for some Sarus Cranes brightened the journey en route to our next port of call, the Little Rann of Kutch, where a

Montagu’s Harrier (female), Blackbuck National Park, Velavadar. Although their numbers have fallen recently they are still abundant and represent a fantastic spectacle hunting widely across the grasslands.


warm traditional welcome awaited us. This time we were treated to some traditional dancing and a camel cart to carry us to our lodge. As usual there were two well-hidden wintering Pallid Scops Owls roosting in the trees around our chalets but buried even deeper into foliage than last time. They could be seen later hunting moths under the lights from the restaurant area. The Little Rann was experi-encing a heat wave so we didn’t delay in getting down to business immediately with a night safari as the sun dipped below the distant salt flats. Some great photo opportunities included a couple of Sykes’s and Indian Little Nightjars, Common Quail, Indian Thick-knee and an Indian Hedgehog.

Each morning saw a huge flight of Demoiselle Cranes passing low over the lodge grounds, calling loudly, and before long we were also on our way out onto the Rann itself in search of the main reason why most eco-tourists make the long journey to this remote corner of India - Asiatic Wild Asses. We could easily find them against an uncomplicated background of the Little Rann’s salt flats, quickly followed by Chestnut-bellied Sandgrouse, a couple of Short-eared Owls and some Common Cranes. The asses were mostly mares and their foals, occasionally pausing to suckle – a delightful sight. There were quite a few harriers around as well as some Short-eared Owls and later in the day we eventually managed to find a pair of Desert Foxes (the same species as Red Fox but a much sandier coloured form) not far from their lair. One of the highlights here this year was the Indian Coursers that obliged with some very nice close views this time in fields not far from our lodge. We were unfortu-nately a little late again for MacQueen’s Bustard, which had probably left at the onset of the recent warmer weather.

Our host at Desert Coursers, Danraj Malik, the son of the former Nawab, is an amazing guy. He built an orphanage in the grounds of his lodge that houses more than 30 children, almost all of them orphaned or abandoned girls, who have a tough time compared to boys even in modern day India. If this was not enough he also owns and runs a school for another 300! Nothing is too much trouble for Danraj and it was great to know that our visit would make a small difference to the lives of the

Black Kites do not seem to be as common as I remember from my first visits to India in the 1990s, maybe a sign that there is less carrion for them to feed on these days?


From top: Our host Danraj Malik; Chestnut-bellied Sandgrouse; Montagu’s Harrier (male) and bottom a small group of Asiatic Wild Asses


From top: Saltpan commuters; Indian Courser; sunset over the Little Rann and bottom: the enigmatic Sykes’s Nightjar (Eric McCabe).The endless salt flats of the Little Rann of Kutch are home to some fantastic creatures!


The magnificent Demoiselle Cranes at Khichan are one of the avian wonders of the world and are a truly surreal sight!

Next came the long road journey north into Rajasthan, a land of silk road desert fortresses, painted camels, gay turbans and unfortunately now wind turbines as well. Before the next wildlife photo session we made a city tour of the historic golden city of Jaisalmer. It is the only one of Rajasthan’s frontier fortresses still to be inhabited, although the folks living within its walls are now mostly em-ployed in the tourism industry as shopkeepers or hoteliers. Dodging cows, scooters and motorized rickshaws we made our way through the narrow alleyways, admiring the amazing ornately decorat-ed yellow sandstone merchants’ houses (or havelis), jain temples and the impressive views over the wider city below. With the hustle and bustle of humanity, open sewers and numerous feral animals opinions ranged from incredible to disgusting. India often divides opinion in this way - you either love or hate it. Over the years I have grown to love it very much! Jaisalmer thrived during the height of the silk trade but with the partition of India in 1947 all cross border trade ceased and it became a sleepy backwater at the end of the line. The rise of tourism has changed its fortunes recently along with tensions between India and Pakistan, which has resulted in a large military presence here. An alternative to the city tour was a walk in the desert around the grounds of our fine hotel, which pro-duced Variable Wheatear and Brown Rock Chat. We saw several Indian Gazelles (or Chinkaras) on the journey to the east through the Thar Desert, which is unsurprisingly the world’s most densely in-habited desert, on our way to the town of Khichan. An evening at a small water tank provided some nice lighting for shooting common waterbirds before our date with the cranes next morning. Gath-ered on the surrounding sand dunes since shortly after dawn, the first of several thousand cranes slowly started to make their way towards the feeding compound in the village, some flying but then later more casual birds walked there and simply hopped over the fence! Eventually they were more or less crammed inside, jostling for position to eat the grain put down for them by the Jain villagers, a practice that has continued here for over 150 years. Their elongated secondary plumes forming interesting patterns as they fed. Images of this captivating scene cannot do it justice alone without the whirring of wings over¬head and the deafening cacophony of the excited cranes.


Agra is home to a pair of world heritage sites and is simply a must for anyone on their first visit to India. The Taj Mahal is by far the most impressive of the two and has a claim to be the most beautiful building in the world.


All too soon it was time to leave and make our final road journey to Jodhpur from where we flew to Delhi, ready to start the next stage of our Indian adventure. After a pilgrimage to marvel at the Taj Mahal, undoubtedly one of the most beautiful buildings in the world, a quick tour of the Agra’s Red Fort followed. Although it is a world heritage site in its own right it is sadly over-shadowed by its more famous neighbour. There were fewer folks around today than usual with state elections taking place the following day – even the one million hawkers and touts seemed to have been cleared away for the benefit of the visiting VIPs and we even saw the fountains in front of the Taj operating for once. As well as spectacular architecture there was also some wildlife to look at, notably a pair of Dusky Eagle Owls nesting in a large tree at the Taj, the adults either side of their two fluffy offspring. Unfortunately they were very high up and not of any real photographic interest. Our very pleasant lodge near the Chambal River was as delightful as ever and although they do not feed the Common Palm Civets here anymore they can still be seen with some persistence in the trees around the grounds after dark. In daytime there are usually some interesting birds in the near vicinity and this year’s visit resulted in some good photo opportunities of Spotted Owlet and Yellow-wattled Lapwing with Indian Thick-knee and Indian Scops Owl also present but a little less co-operative this time.

However, it was the National Chambal Sanctuary we had come here to visit and our morning river cruise on the lovely river was the most productive photo session of the whole tour with many of us taking well over 1,000 photos of numerous different subjects. The cruise started with some attrac-tive River Lapwings (now a threatened bird of the Indian Subcontinent’s large slow-flowing rivers) and the peculiar but even more photogenic Great Thick-knee (there were three pairs of this amaz-ing bird on the stretch of river we checked). Soon afterwards we caught up with the number one target on this excursion, the amazing Indian Skimmer, with its ‘snapped-off’ shorter upper mandible, bouncy flight and from time to time living up to its name with some skimming. There was a group of 50-60 birds, settling down to breed on sand banks in the river that allowed some very close ap-proach in perfect light – FANTASTIC STUFF! After this highlight we cruised up and down picking up more interesting subjects, notably Gharial. The National Chambal Sanctuary was declared in 1978 mostly to protect the critically endangered Gharial, the bizarre long-snouted fish-eating crocodile. Named after the Nepalese word ‘ghara’ meaning earthenware pot, referring to the enlarged growth on the end of the snout of mature males, which can grow to six metres long and one tonne in weight (second only to the monstrous Saltwater Crocodile). Again we saw one beast with a large pot but unfortunately it evaded the camera. There are less than 400 breeding pairs left in its remaining range, a mere 2% of its former distribution, which used to include Pakistan, Burma and the Brah-maputra. A truly magnificent animal!

The endangered, long-snouted, fish-eating Gharial is one of India’s most enigmatic creatures. This is a female.


Chambal River bird life (clockwise from top): Indian Skimmer still thrives here; Little Pratincole can usually be seen in flocks of hundreds; River Lapwing, another declining large river specialist and Yellow-wattled Lapwing


Bengal Tiger - the ultimate photographic target! This sleepy female was shot from elephant back.

A rich variety of wildlife can still be found on the Chambal, including pretty much all of the character-istic species of the large slow-flowing rivers of the Gangetic drainage system that were once found all over northern India. It is like stepping back in time and other relics included Woolly-necked Stork, Indian Black Ibis, Comb Duck and Black-bellied Tern. Also here were: flotillas of Bar-headed Geese grazing on the weed in the river; Ruddy Shelducks, paired up and several Golden Jackals were prowling the riverbank. A 960km long tributary of the filthy River Yamuna, the Chambal River has escaped development and its inevitable pollution owing to the river being considered unholy! It was said to have been cursed by a princess as well as carried the blood of thousands of sacrificed cows, ironically saving it from the even worse fate that has befallen the other rivers around it.

One of our final encounters was with a group of cute Small Pratincoles, some of which, after a patient wait, ventured quite close to drink from the water near our boats. Also here were smart River Terns, White-browed Wagtails and a few Temminck’s Stints. After yet another delightful meal we made our way back north to the bright lights of Agra, then Delhi and the next stop on our tour, the ‘Kipling Country’ of Madhya Pradesh state.

As always travel in India involves overcoming a few obstacles and after the election fever in Uttar Pradesh we now had to contend with the collapse of Kingfisher Airlines. Fortunately our agent had managed to switch the rest of the flights on the tour that we had booked with them to alternative air-lines but one remained, the only way to fly to Jabalpur, in Madhya Pradesh’s famous ‘Kipling Coun-try’. We were lucky that they had received a temporary reprieve and we could make the flight without


A male Bengal Tiger ambles across a meadow at Bandhavgarh (he was actually trying to evade the Indian VIPs following him around, which he did in the end, slipping away in the opposite direction).

a hitch. Flying south over the northern Deccan, fields grew smaller, areas of deciduous woodland more frequent with the odd rocky outcrop here and there. Once at Jabalpur our flashy transfer cars made short work of the road transfer to our first destination, Bandhavgarh, except for the last stretch of the road into the park, which is deliberately not maintained to discourage speeding. Again this road transfer produced our only White-rumped Vulture sightings of the whole trip. This would have been unthinkable at the time of my first visit to India many years ago! Our arrival coincided with the new practice of closing national parks in Madhya Pradesh on Wednesday afternoons so we had a drive around the buffer zone, managing a few reasonable encounters with Hanuman Langurs, Yel-low-wattled Lapwings, Green Bee-eaters and Siberian Stonechats. Needless to say we were keen to get down to business in the park itself.

For the next four days we stuck to a routine of an early morning jeep safari in the 437 sq km national park, lasting until lunchtime followed by a break and then another safari in the afternoon until dusk. Although travelling around the park in jeeps sometimes feels like the ‘whacky races’, Bandhavgarh maintains a reputation of being one of the most reliable reserves to produce a tiger sighting and that is pretty much what everyone is here for. Frustratingly the majority of tiger sightings were being reported from the busy Magadhi zone so we had to endure the very bumpy 10km each way drive there each time as well as clouds of dust and at least one million other jeeps tearing around the un-regulated routes in the hope of a sighting. We managed an average number of sightings here, four in total, including one tiger show for one of the jeeps. We split our safaris between Magadhi the much more picturesque and quiet Tala zone but did not have any sightings in the latter. There were three tigresses in Tala at the time of our visit, apparently with young cubs that were too young to be shown by the elephants. This should be spot-on for our 2013 tour but it is no consolation to those visiting in 2012. We would all have preferred more luck but as some of our party reminded us, it is still possible to miss tiger completely, so we should be thankful for what we did manage to shoot.

Usually the best photographic opportunities come from elephant back ‘tiger shows’. These are also a means of earning extra revenue for the park, not to mention tips for your guides, so the trackers


and forest guards put in a lot of effort to make them happen. Even so tiger shows still only average around one or two per week. If you are lucky then the photographic possibilities will be good but you cannot do much about composition – sometimes the tiger is helpful in its positioning, sometimes not. Our first encounter was a tiger show, a female with two almost fully-grown cubs, lazing in the shade off one of the jeep tracks in Magadhi. After looking around a bit and yawning she eventually got up and wandered off with the cubs, elephants in pursuit. The second encounter was a young male seen on the jeep tracks one morning, he obviously didn’t like the attention of the small group of jeeps and loped off into the jungle after showing us his backside only most of the time. Then came a fine adult male tiger that was walked across the one of the meadows a couple of times by some elephant back VIPs. No public tiger show today, just some over-privileged students getting too close to the tiger, which had been quite happy sat in the shade of some bamboo where we could all have taken some more natural photos. Encounters are something of a lottery but we were lucky to bump into the same male again, later in the morning, walking along the jeep tracks and scent-marking his territory, snarling from time to time – a much more satisfactory natural encounter. Tiger reserves are mostly far from a wilderness experience but they are nevertheless a fascinating one and it is incredible to think that such predators have been allowed to survive in a landscape in relative close proximity to man. One of the problems now is that everyone wants to see a tiger so we have to be prepared for company.

Just as it was at Gir it is important to learn Spotted Deer’s alarm call to follow a big cat’s progress when it is out of sight. This can work the other way in that if there are lots of deer around and no alarm calls then you can relax and look at something else instead! All except two of us left Bandhavgarh and its 2000 year old fort with some acceptable tiger photos achieved but this lovely landscape is not just about tigers. It also has a wealth of bird life, some of which strayed to within DSLR range in

A Brown Fish-Owl keeps a beady eye on us from its daytime roost at Bandhavgarh


breaks between tiger hunting. Indian Rollers were even more photogenic than last time and other birds photographed included: Lesser Adjutant Stork; Eurasian Griffon, Indian and Red-headed Vul-tures; Red Junglefowl; Brown Fish Owl; Tickell’s and Orange-headed Ground Thrush of note. There was also plenty of tiger food around the park in the form of Wild Boar, Indian Muntjac and Sambars as well as the ubiquitous Spotted Deer and Northern Plains (or Hanuman) Langur monkeys.

Our last stop on the main tour was the Mukki Zone of Kanha National Park, probably the nicest of all with its lovely Sal Forest just coming into leaf and quieter jeep tracks. It was a disappointment that there were no tiger shows happening here at all during our visit, although we did see the mahoots and their elephants around a lot and one of very first foray into the park a tigress walked across the track right in front of the jeep containing the two folks who had not yet got decent tiger photos, cam-era settings correct and at the ready to shoot. Phew!

We enjoyed some other photographic opportunities at Kanha but generally it was quite hot from early in the morning and good photographic light was therefore limited. Gaur, the huge wild forest-dwelling ox, appear to be doing well at Kanha and we encountered several groups there. The shaggy-coated Barasinghe, the endangered ‘hard ground’ form of Swamp Deer were also numerous and easy to photograph at times along with many of the other now familiar Indian mammals. The grounds and immediate vicinity of our lodge were also quite birdy and we enjoyed birds such as Jungle Owlet and Greater Coucal.

India remains in my opinion the most fascinating country on earth to travel in. There is always so much happening, especially on the streets. The final journey for folks on our India Wildlife Spec-tacular main tour only was from Kanha to the nearby industrial steel (and concrete) city of Raipur,

Northern Plains Langur and an impressive Swamp Deer stag of the endangered ‘hard ground’ form, which is easily seen at Kanha National Park.


A wonderful portrait of a male Shikra in a Ghost Tree at Kanha National Park (Eric McCabe)


Crested Serpent Eagle, Kanha National Park

made more interesting this time by the religious festival of ‘Holi’. Traditionally this is a festival that celebrates the coming of spring but it now involves people throwing brightly-coloured powder paint on each other on a very large scale! The journey through the numerous small villages en route to Raipur passed without incident, however, there were a lot of folks covered in paint, mostly children and men – the ladies stay indoors!

Those of us on the Assam post-tour extension took a flight to Kolkata where we made another short overnight city stay before we were up again for an early morning flight to Guwahati, the regional capital of Assam. Kaziranga is a wild landscape of tall elephant grass as far as the eye can see, scattered patches of forest and large wetlands on the floodplain of the mighty Brahmaputra River, which inundates it each monsoon. It is also India’s premier large herbivore experience bar none and is a sad reminder what much of the Terai (the belt of grassland across the northern part of the subcontinent) must have looked like in ancient times. It was established more than 100 years ago thanks to a concerned Lady Mary Curzon, wife of the then Viceroy of India, after she visited the area and failed to see a single rhino.

If only she could see the place now with a population of over 2000 rhinos! Our road transfer went perfectly to plan this time and we arrived at Kaziranga in good time for an afternoon safari. Late winter is grass-burning season in Assam (to promote regrowth) but fortunately there appeared to have been a break for the Holi festival and the air quality was much better than on last year’s tour. However, the numerous brickworks and bamboo paper mills en route in the Brahmaputra valley were still pumping out clouds of smoke as we travelled eastwards and I managed to make a note of a few bizarre warning signs painted onto road¬side boulders that I missed last time like ‘keep your nerve on the curve’, ‘if you are married, divorce speed’ and ‘if you sleep your family will weep’. The daily elephant rides got us quite close to some grumpy Indian Rhinos and the attractive ginger form of Swamp Deer at Kaziranga, although the former often had their faces stuck in the new grass regrowth. We managed some nice portraits and ‘landscape’ images of Rhinos as well as some great


Top right: Wild Images group members Mike and Malcolm get used to in-line elephant back riding Kaziranga style amongst rhinos and (top left and below) Wild Water Buffaloes


One-horned Rhinoceros. This animal is the number one conservation success story at Kaziranga, where their numbers now exceed 2000!


Wild Water Buffalo encounters in the eastern range, however, the elephants stayed a little further away and our visit to the western range was cancelled when it was closed owing to the relocation of a rhino to Manas National Park.

Tigers remain as elusive as ever at Kaziranga and again we failed to see one, although views here are usually rather distant – they are absolutely not habituated as in the other parks. Smooth-coated Otter and Hog Deer were also new for the tour here on the mammal front with new birds including: Spot-billed Pelican; Pallas’s Fish-eagle and Slender-billed Vultures. All of these three large spe-cies are gradually being squeezed out of the modern landscape but retain a foothold at Kaziranga. Swamp Francolin is another threatened species that thrives in the national park and we managed a few sightings of this as well as Grey-headed Lapwing, Asian Barred Owlet (the eighth owl species for the tour, which sat outside my window calling its head off each morning), Great Hornbill, Blue-naped Pitta (unfortunately only the worst ever record shot of that one, by the time the folks in my jeep realized what was going on) and Blue-bearded Bee-eater. Passerines included: Grey-backed Shrikes from Tibet and, for the twitchers amongst us, a couple of Spot-winged Starlings - a particular-ly sought-after nomadic visitor that gathers here in late winter to feast on Silk Cotton Tree blossoms.

Our final photo session was a brief (for obvious reasons) visit to the god awful Boragaon Dump near Guwahati. This monstrous landfill site is the hangout of most of Assam’s Greater Adjutant storks, one of the world’s most endangered birds and Asia’s super ugly Marabou counterpart. The storks are quite nervous of folks other than the many people who scavenge on the dump and all flew off towards the surrounding ‘meadows’, not before we managed a few photos though. The dump is a very unpleasant place to spend any length of time so we made a sharp exit, dodging the tipper trucks and hordes of children crowding around them even before they are tipped, looking for items of miniscule value. It is a very sad sight indeed in today’s modern India. Little girls should be at school or playing with their friends, not having to do things like this. Not much is being done about what is a fairly widespread phenomenon in India although interestingly Australian cricketer and all-round good bloke, Brett Lee, has a foundation ‘Mewsic’, which raises funds to provide an alternative to this dreadful lifestyle. Passing the shanty town of hovels actually constructed on the dump itself as we left this place was another reminder of how fortunate we are. And so ended our amazing journey across India, from the dry, deciduous teak forest of Gujurat to the grasslands of the northeast, we were now closer to Hong Kong than Delhi!

Left: Black-billed Roller and right: Great Hornbills are both a common sight in the gallery forests of Kaziranga


Greater Adjutant Storks, Boragaon Landfill Site, Guwahati. It seems strange to see one of the world’s most endangered birds in a setting like this - surely it cannot be good for their health?

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