Rajasthan birding - Keoladeo Ghana National Park (Bharatpur)

Rajasthan trip report here...

With spare days now on hand and Raja not available in Jaipur, we dashed off to Keoladeo Ghana National Park or more commonly called the Bharatpur bird sanctuary to spend our remaining days of the trip that turned out to be an excellent decision with us being there at the right time. Bharatpur, is as small area but is an excellent avifauna sanctuary that hosts thousands of birds, especially during the winter season and people flock here for many reasons – photography, bird watching, cycling around the whole park or just walking and spending quality time listening to the birds and nothing else.

We stayed for a night at Iora guest house, run by Mr. Devendra Singh, that is the most recommended place and another night at his friend’s place, Sanctuary Tourist lodge both of which were good and comfortable and most importantly run by folks who are good birders themselves and who can help arrange good guides or rickshaws to wander around the park days together.

We hired cycle rickshaws for the whole day birding at Bharatpur and it turned out to be another good decision as the cycle riders also double up as birding guides and we had the best of them accompanying us around. Being my first visit, I was pretty much awed by the place and the charm it exuded and not to skip the amount of birds we saw, nothing less than a good 100 species of birds! Definitely a place for another visit and at leisure to hire a bicycle and go solo.

The birdlife we sighted at Bharatpur was a long list that included Sarus Crane, Black Bittern, Bank Myna, Bluethroat, Siberian Rubythroat, Dusky Eagle Owl, Ferruginous Duck, Red-crested Pochard, Graylag Goose, Cotton Pygmy Goose, Red Munia, Streaker Weaver and many more. After 10 good days of soaking in the wildlife of Rajasthan and roaming around the desert scapes, it was time to bid adieu to our cabbie who was par excellent, very accommodative and humble and ensured we had good food wherever we stopped. We spent the next day shopping full thus ensuring our baggage ended up being overloaded.

It was a long, entertaining, fulfilling trip with good company and plenty of moments to cherish for a long time. Just hope the bustards do not vanish but multiply for the generations to see them in the wild.