Two days in Thekaddy

It's been a long time since I've posted anything from India and I couldn't have found a better place to re-engage with Wild India! Here's a few images from last week's trip to the Periyar Tiger Reserve in Thekaddy, Kerala.

I was last here in Jan of 2004 and it felt amazing to be back. This time I had an old school friend (Vineet) along with me and as soon as we got there (late evening) we signed up for an early morning hike in the forest. This would be my second time doing this hike and I really hoped that it would be as great as my last one!

Early next morning we headed to a small guard house on the edge of the forest where a slightly eccentric local Adivasi (tribal) guide awaited us. After we wore the anti-Leech socks that he provided we headed straight into the forest.

This was Vineet's first tryst with real wildlife and I was hoping that we could see something.. A tiger would have been great but I knew that was asking for too much so I was willing to settle on some wild elephants..

And for the first hour or so we had no luck with mammals but I kept ticking away on my bird list - mostly the usual suspects.. like the (above) Jungle Myna (Acridotheres fuscus)

and we also observed some insects .. butterflies.. spiders...

a whole group of flying Plum-headed Parakeet (Psittacula cyanocephala), I found this guy sitting on one of the tall trees..

And an hour into our hike we came across a couple of wild elephants.. Now the think about wild elephants is that people don't really understand that this is probably the most dangerous animal you can come across in India - because they are a familiar sight to most indians (either literally or culturally) people tend to think of them as tender/calm animals..

Now this was also when we realized that our guide was really crazy, in a attempt to show us the elephants and his bravery he kept trying to get closer to the elephants to a point where the elephants were clearly aware of our presence and one of them even signaled a loud warning to us. Thankfully the elephants were heading in the opposite direction and was descending into a slight valley allowing us to have some great views of them.

One of them was a tiny tusker!

By then we had started to stop our guide from getting carried away and asked him to head in another direction away from the elephants.

Moving on we came across more birds ..

first there was a lone Southern Hill Myna (Gracula religiosa indica)

and then a tree full of them...

And while we took a small break near a stream I photographed this beautiful

Stream Ruby (Rhinocypha bisignata)

a Loten's Sunbird (Cinnyris lotenius)

a White-breasted Waterhen (Amaurornis phoenicurus)

and as we were about to end our trail I found this charming little fellow - a Heart-spotted Woodpecker (Hemicircus canente)

Vineet was now slightly bitten by the wildlife bug so we decided to extend our stay in Thekaddy by one more night and to go for the night-time hike in the forest.

But we had a few hours to kill before it was night and since this is famous land of the spices I decided that we should check out a spice garden.

And while we were walking thru a spice garden I got found this endemic (a lifer for me) - White-bellied Treepie (Dendrocitta leucogastra)

and not far from the tree pie was this great Blue Mormon (Papilio polymnestor)...

It was finally getting dark ....

Very few forests in India allow visitors to walk inside the forest and even fewer allow you to walk when its completely dark! It is a great experience.. not soo much for the wildlife cos you can't see much .. but for the ambiance of the forest by night .. the sounds .. the smells .. and of course the fear! It's awesome..

Once again our most crucial safety feature was the anti-Leech socks .. but this time there were two guides .. one of whom was an armed forest guard - just in case!

Surprisingly we saw a large no. of Sambar dear (Cervus unicolor) grazing along the river's edge and as expected heard some crazy sounds.. once again totally worth it! If you ever go to Thekkady don't miss the night hike! It's a great way to experience the forest...