India 2019 - Wonderful Vanghat

February 4^th 2019

The morning safari out into the forest before breakfast was only short but it still managed to add several new species to the list including buff barred warbler, Whistler’s warbler and a fine common green magpie. The Corbett part of the trip wasn’t over as we lucked in on four otters fishing in the river on the edge of the camp. Another 2 species were added along with 2 golden jackal before we left the park for Vanghat.

Two Asian barred owlets were on the roadside as we headed over the hills towards Vanghat. We met the Vanghat guides at the suspension bridge and walked into the camp with Anil. There is no vehicle access into the camp so our bags had to be carried to an old jeep which took them down to the river. From there they (along with us) went across the river on a bamboo raft before being carried (the bags not us) the rest of the way into the camp. We took the walk option which was good after having spent several days birding from a vehicle. The walk added a few new species including fire-tailed sunbird and red-billed blue magpie. We emptied our bags into our room and had a late lunch while watching the camp feeding station. There were plenty of birds about including grey treepie, red-billed leiothrix and rusty-cheeked scimitar-babbler amongst the hoardes of jungle babblers.

Asian barred owlet

After lunch we headed down to the river for a couple of hours. Pretty much the first bird we saw was a wallcreeper that flew by and started feeding on the riverbed! I then spotted a little forktail standing on the rocks in the rapids on the edge of the river. Always great birds to see and a strange combination of dipper and wagtail. We walked upstream and Rachael spotted another forktail on the far bank, this time a spotted forktail! Good views were had as a pair fed along the shoreline on the far side. All of a sudden two great hornbills flew over the canopy and landed in the trees. They were very hard to see perched up but superbly massive birds. A blue rock thrush on the riverbank was an unexpected bonus. Two goral, a small goat-like mammal were found by Anil on the hillside opposite the camp. In the late afternoon light and against the vegetation they were pretty hard to see when they were not moving. Although not rare, they are normally pretty elusive.

We ended the afternoon by adding small niltava and grey headed woodpecker, both around the camp, to the list.

Little forktail

Spotted forktail

Great hornbill

Wallcreeper

February 5^th 2019

We were up before it got light for our morning walking safari. The walk started with an ‘interesting’ safety briefing on what to do if we encountered big cats or elephants! If it was a big cat we had to make as much noise as possible while waving our arms about in the hope we’d scare it off but on no account run. On the other hand, if it was an elephant, run and try and discard an item of clothing to draw its attention!!!!! This wasn’t quite what we were expecting to hear and to be honest a little disconcerting as we headed across the river and into the forest. It was rather unnerving then when Anil said that the goats alarm calling in the steep river valley next to us were probably doing that because there was a leopard in the area! To say is was slightly distracted from the birding was an understatement and thankfully we didn’t come across anything to warrant our new training although we did find a couple of old tiger scats.

The walk was good if a little quiet. The birds were again in mixed flocks and the trick was finding them. When we did they were big and had a nice selection of species. The bulk were oriental white-eye but the mixed flocks also included bar-tailed treecreeper, lemon-rumped warbler, long-tailed minivet, black throated and black lored tits. No brown fishowls were in the usual roost locations but we did see both forktail species at the waterfall before we headed back to camp.

We had a couple of hours to relax and bird within the camp fence. Great hornbills and griffon vultures were over the valley and there was time to photograph the birds coming to feeding station.

Black bulbul

Blue whistling-thrush

Fulvous breasted woodpecker

Grey treepie

Grey winged blackbird

Afternoon walk behind the camp through some fields that were really good. The plantation felt really birdy and held some quality species including a male Himalayan bluetail, rufous gorgeted flycatcher and a smart male grey-winged blackbird. We headed further up the hill to a flowering cotton tree that had been attracting large numbers of birds but it was a bit late in the afternoon and there were no birds. We did add black-chinned yhunia to the list and I found some grey-headed woodpecker feathers for my collection.

The last couple of hours were spent sat by the river attempting to photograph the two species of water-redstart. The light wasn’t great but I managed a few shots.

Plumbeous water-redstart

February 6^th 2019

A final pre-breakfast walk around the camp and down to the river. A couple of female samba deer crossed the river before we spooked a male that we hadn’t seen. His alarm calls echoed around the valley and it legged it across the river into the forest. The little forktail showed well again but it was still too dark for any photos. We added great barbet to the list and Anil saw his 400spp, a rather skulking aberrant bush warbler. 

Nice views of collared falconet in the camp before we left sat in the top of the large cotton tree. It was amazing how small they were and in flight they reminded me of a weird cross between a beeeater and a martin…! Breakfast added greater yellownape to the list and then white capped bunting (3) near the bridge as we said goodbye to the excellent Vanghat team and met up again with JP for the journey to Sat Tal.

A couple of stops on the way produced Nepal wren babbler and long billed thrush but we dipped on ibisbill for a 2^nd time.

We had a long and winding journey up to Sat Tal where we arrived in the late afternoon but despite this there was still some time to do some birding. The excellent photography hide added 4 new species while a walk around the hotel surrounds with JP produced a few more. The last new species of the day were a couple of rufous chinned laughingthrush at the feeding station; the 300^th species of the trip.

Rufous chinned laughingthrush

Small niltava

India 2019 - Corbett Tiger Reserve

February 1^st 2019

Well, our train was due to leave Old Delhi at 10:30pm but after many hours sat in a waiting room listening to endless announcements apologising for pretty much every train being late, we eventually left the platform at 2am! We had taken the sleeper train as it was always on time unlike the usual afternoon service! We were in a 2^nd Class sleeper carriage which was actually not too bad. The beds were a bit short, especially for Rachael, but they were not too uncomfortable and we were pretty knackered so sleep wasn’t too bad. Having said that, with the movement of the train, the noise and the snoring, it wasn’t the best night’s sleep I’ve ever had! Somehow the train managed to make up 1 1/2hrs overnight and we arrived at Ramnagar at 7:30am where we headed off for breakfast and a short break while we met our guide, JP, for the next few days. We had now managed to catch up the time we’d lost waiting for the train the night before and were back on the birding trail.

A brief stop Ibisbill was unsuccessful but we did manage to see a rather smart wallcreeper grubbing around on a sandbar in the middle of the river. Really not the kind of habitat you expect to see then in when you’re used to seeing them on tall cliff faces.

Crested kingfisher

From there we carried on to the entrance to the famous Corbett Tiger Reserve before spending a couple of hours driving and birding through the park towards our destination for the next couple of nights; the Dhikala Camp. All of the birding in Corbett had to be from the vehicle which at times could be a bit frustrating but it was better than being eaten by a tiger! We managed to see a few flocks of small birds but they were very hard to keep up with but the kaliji pheasant and tawny fish owl were a bit easier to see.

The camp at Dhikala was pretty basic, hard beds, limited electricity and hot water but the food was probably the best of the trip.

Male grey bushchat

The afternoon was spent looking around the river area (along with everyone else) for tiger but although there were 2 females with cub in the local area, none were seen. This was probably not that surprising given that the forest is very thick in the park unlike other tiger sites in the rest of India. We did have good views of a small group of elephants including a small baby. At one stage they were blocking the track and so we had to wait for them to continue on their way.

Many new species added today with the change in habitat including river lapwing, velvet-fronted nuthatch, crested treeswift, lesser fish eagle, changeable hawk eagle, brown fish owl, slaty blue flycatcher and cinereous vulture.

Changeable hawk eagle

Crested treeswift

River lapwing

February 2^nd 2019

An early morning start for a tiger safari around the grassland close to the camp. It was a cold start start to the day with mist and a touch of frost on the ground. No luck with tiger so we headed towards the river. JP spotted some fresh tiger pug marks and then we found a parked up jeep who told us that someone had seen a tiger in the area earlier in the morning. We decided to move on a bit further and stopped around the corner. All of a sudden Rachael spotted a tiger on the side of the river! Panic, excitement and relief set in as the large male crossed the river as the rest of the jeeps raced to our location. Despite being at least 500m away the size of the animal was impressive. Despite looking into the sun with the misty early conditions you could still clearly see the orange colour and the stripes as it crossed the river with its tail held up high. It showed in better light after it came out of the river before disappearing into the grassland. I was shaking with excitement as we raced off to the other side of the river to see if we could intercept it again but sadly, despite lots of eyes looking, there was no further sign. We added a few birds during the morning including rufous bellied eagle, red junglefowl and white bellied drongo.

Lunchtime was a bit of an interesting experience as we caused a bit of chaos by finding 2 tigers by ourselves. The first one was lying in the middle of the river out from the camp. It was never close but it showed pretty well. Rachael went and told a couple of people who were fairly close to us that we had on and then all hell broke loose with people running over trying to see it in my scope. A few people did before the animal walked off into the grass and we didn’t see it again. After things settled down and people went into lunch Rachael spotted another tiger, much closer walking to the edge of the river before sitting down on the bank. Again we called it and people came rushing out of lunch to get views. Again, this animal didn’t hang around long and walked across the river and out of sight. It was good to have got loads of people onto the tigers and let them see them through the scope. A little girl even came over as we were eating lunch to say thank you. We were buzzing from the experience. We even managed to add a new bird to the list in the form of a white tailed rubythroat.

One tiger was sitting in the furthest part of the river. The 2nd was where the 2 rivers meet in the foregound!

Crested serpent eagle

Just as we were waiting to go out with the jeep there was a commotion and the tractor that was cutting the grass outside of the camp started revving its engine and was rushing back to the camp at high speed. The mahoots with the elephants that were coming back to the camp were shouting and the elephants were unsettled because there was a tiger in the area. The gates to the camp were closed and no vehicles were allowed to leave the camp. Everyone rushed over to the fence to see the tiger despite being told to move away. I was lucky enough to see the tiger cross the road just outside the camp. Once the tiger had moved off we were allowed out of the camp but the grassland area remained closed to allow the animal some space from any disturbance. We later found out that tiger had actually attacked the tractor so it was no wonder they were driving it so fast!

We went birding in the afternoon and managed to get one of my target birds; great slaty woodpecker. We had heard them calling on the drive in but now we managed to get good views. Three birds were around a nesthole with a 4^th bird close by. As we came back along the river section JP heard a macaque alarm calling so we stopped to check for tiger. We heard a male growling in the bushes close to the track but despite spending a lot of time waiting it never did show. The fact there were spotted deer feeding on the track probably meant it wasn’t hungry.

Black faced languar

Spotted deer

It was a shame it didn’t show but it had been a pretty special day.

February 3^rd 2019

Misty morning safari around the grassland/woodland edge. Stopped for a while when there were some deer alarm calls and added black throated thrush, common rosefinch and red headed vulture to the list. Reports of a spot bellied eagle owl across the river sent us in that direction. The brown fish owl was again sat in its favoured tree but we didn’t managed to catch up with the eagle owl. A brief stop of the way back to camp for a beeeater sp over the trees produced a slice of luck in the form of a collared falconet sat in the treetops; another target bird added. A nice couple of crested buntings were also seen on the drive back through the grassland.

Brown fish owl

Another check for spot bellied eagle owl after lunch proved eventually successful with a bird flying through the trees and perching. Despite seeing where the bird had landed it was still really tricky to locate especially as we couldn’t get out of the vehicle. After a lot of moving back and forward we managed to get into a position where we could see the bird roosting. With the tripod on full extent out of the vehicle I managed to grab a few phonescope pics. A great bird and well worth the effort.

Spot bellied eagle owl

We then started to leave Dhikala and head towards our next guesthouse within the park. We just missed another tiger crossing the road that another vehicle had just seen. Despite hearing the deer alarm calls it never showed again. The rest of the drive produced stork-billed kingfisher, bronzed drongo and white crested laughingthrush. A stop at a river watchpoint gave us excellent views of gharial and mugger crocodile hauled out on the bank. The final bird of the day was added at dusk in the form of a collared owlet.

2 gharial & mugger crocodile