In search of the 33 endemics of Serendib

The birds looked similar to those in India, but not quite. The Malabar grey hornbill had whitened its belly and shed its supercilium and the vernal hanging parrot sported a bright red crown. Was I having a pleasant dream with colour hallucinations?

Sri Lanka grey hornbill, Kitulgala, Sri Lanka by Ashok Thampi

Sri Lanka hanging parrot, Kitulgala by Ashok Thampi

Not quite. We were in Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon and even earlier Serendib- the origin of the most apt word serendipity or pleasant surprise) on a birding and wildlife tour. Unfolding in font of us was living proof of Darwin's theory of evolution. Separated by just a few miles from the mainland, the fauna had evolved enough to create 33 endemic bird species found just here and nowhere else on earth. Throw in an amazing variety of habitats from undisturbed rainforest to scrub semi-desert, and of course all the migratory sub continental species, and this pocket sized island boasts a bird list of 450: a third of the number seen in India.

The Makaranda rainforest adjoining the Kelani river

We drove due east from Colombo along the Kelani river to Kitulgala. Famous for the site where the film Bridge on The River Kwai was shot, the Kelani river is one of the numerous lifelines of the country that flows out from the central highlands. Located on the edge of the Makaranda rain forest, the buffer zone was home to numerous colourful endemics. All green and lilac Layard's parakeets were easily differentiated from the huge Alexandrine ones. The Sri Lanka green pigeon was formerly the pompadour green pigeon. The Sri Lanka swallows showed off their lovely rufous belly and brown cheeks as they posed on a wire. The majestic male jungle fowls here had a bright yellow patch on their crest while the crimson backed goldenback, a cousin of the greater goldenback, was an amazing bright crimson. Orange billed babblers eclipsed their drab yellow billed cousins while the chestnut backed owlet escaped into its nest to avoid being mobbed by a bunch of sunbirds. The spot winged thrush made up for its earlier elusiveness by posing for a long time for the cameras. The Sri Lanka drongo looked like a cross between the racket tailed and the Spangled. Yellow fronted barbets and black capped bulbuls swelled our list of lifers. This being March, many of the birds were mating or nesting in preparation for the upcoming monsoon. It wasn't all about the home team (the endemics) though. Typical Western Ghats species were the bread and butter between which the home boys were literally jammed in: the Oriental dwarf kingfisher and brown breasted flycatcher were personal lifers.

In search of the very rare Serendip scops owl, re-discovered a few years ago after half a century, we undertook the Makaranda rainforest trek. A closed canopy, 100% humidity, a light drizzle and of course a million leeches were our constant company. You can't even sit for fear of allowing leeches in above your extensive guard! Lovely habitat, but not for the faint hearted. Rainforest birding certainly teaches you patience, and doubled our appreciation of the delicious Sri Lankan cuisine after what was literally a draining experience (between the humidity and the leeches)!

Sri Lanka Green_Pigeon, Yala by Ashok Thampi

Sri Lankan Swallow, Kitulgala by Ashok Thampi

Black capped bulbul, Kitulgala by Ashok Thampi

Sri Lanka junglefowl male, Sinharaja by Ashok Thampi

Yellow fronted barbet, Kitulgala, Sri Lanka by Sanjay Patwardhan

Chestnut backed owlet by Nikhil Bhopale

Orange billed babbler, Kitulgala, Sri Lanka by Ashok Thampi

Brown breasted flycatcher, Nuwara Eliya by Ashok Thampi

Crimson backed goldenback, Kitulgala by Ashok Thampi

We set off on the climb to Nuwara Eliya (1868 m), winding our way through the extensive patchwork of tea gardens. Tea is a major industry but I wonder how the hillsides would have looked had the native forests been allowed to stand: whatever remains is in very high or inaccessible areas. Nuwara Eliya was similar to Indian hill stations, reminding us of our common British colonial pasts: pleasant climate, a lake with boating, quaint cottages, a golf course and many tea rooms. Victoria Park (how could it be named anything else!) was our destination however: sure enough the Sri Lankan whiteye (thicker eye ring and darker green) and the photogenic yellow eared bulbul were added to the list. Confirmation that Sri Lanka remains a preferred destination for migratory species from far away was obtained when the Kashmir flycatcher showed up, lovely orange throat illuminating its otherwise drab brown appearance. The shy pied thrush titillated us from one tree to the other, affording only brief glimpses from angles that left our craning necks in spasm.

Kashmir flycatcher, Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka by Ashok Thamp

Sri Lanka whiteye, Nuwara Eliya by Ashok Thampi

Yellow eared bulbul, Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka by Ashok Thampi

The next morning at daybreak we headed to Horton Plains National Park, a unique montane forest and grassland habitat and World Heritage site. The purple faced leaf monkeys, so furry here that they are called bear monkeys, glowered at us as we entered and a sambar stag munched unconcerned by the roadside. Here the extensive grassy patana is interspersed with patches of montane forest were drainage of water is better, much like the shola forests of the western ghats. Despite having a very heavy footfall from general tourists and trekkers, the maintenance is outstanding: have you ever had all plastic bags confiscated and bottle top seals and stickers removed while entering an Indian national park?

Horton Plains is a mix of water, grasslands and montane forest

Purple faced leaf monkey, Sinharaja, Sri Lanka by Sanjay Patwardhan

Kok...kok-kok-kok went the Sri Lanka scimitar babbler for a long time followed by the rapid click-click-click of long lenses when a close up sighting of it shortly afterwards. Then followed the dull blue flycatcher and the Sri Lanka bush warbler with its orange-buff throat. Three main target species for this habitat done and dusted, we languorously admired and photographed the numerous dull blue flycatchers, whiteyes and yellow eared bulbuls. Whistling thrushes are generally easily found on the road and around water in the Himalayas and Western Ghats: not so the globally threatened, shy and small Sri Lanka one which failed to reveal itself despite calling from close at hand. A pity we would never see it as we would not re-enter its habitat again on this trip.

Dull blue flycatcher, Horton Plains, Sri Lanka by Ashok Thampi

As we left the hill country, a couple of water bodies close to Yala quenched our thirst for water dwellers. The yellow bittern, pheasant tailed jacana and grey headed fish eagle, allowed us to approach closer for photos than I have ever experienced elsewhere. A most confusing tern class followed: the rare white winged tern banked and dived amidst the commoner little, gull billed and whiskered varieties. I had never before seen either the Indian or the Oriental scops owls: when we encountered the two species sitting next to each other in the verandah of a cottage, my eyes nearly popped out in amazement! A perfect sundowner for the day was another endemic, the Sri Lanka woodshrike.

Yellow bittern, Thissamaharama by Ashok Thampi

Indian scops owl and Oriental scops owl together at Thissamaharama, Sri Lanka by Ashok Thampi

Sri Lankan Woodshrike by Ashok Thampi

Yala. A name synonymous with leopards, and its popularity with tourists was obvious in the 200 odd vehicles which queued up patiently half an hour before park entry at dawn. Located in the dry zone on the south eastern coast of the country, the habitat we were entering was quite different from the ones we had spent time in so far, and we expected a profusion of the same bird species encountered in India, rather than any endemics. In the absence of tigers whose entry into the subcontinent from Asia was too late to make it across the Palk Straits, leopards rule here as the apex predator. 

The morning sun was beating down. We were having a wonderfully relaxed time admiring such handsome citizens as the brown fish owl, the white bellied sea eagle, white rumped shama and the great thicknee, and the bird list had swollen steadily. A tree full of a dozen squabbling Malabar pied hornbills kept us enthralled. Spotted deer, wild boar, monitor lizards, elephants and mongooses were all over the place. A stop on the coast inside the national park for breakfast gave us time to admire the bright blue sea adjoining the huge crops of rock and ponds  quintessential of Yala.

Can almost imagine the leopard in it's typical Yala home

At the coast inside Yala

Clash of Malabar pied hornbills at Yala by Ashok Thampi

Breakfast, early wakening and heat had induced a certain torpor in us. And then, a spotted gentleman strolled across the road in front of us! Adrenaline pumping, cameras were grabbed as the young leopard crossed a grassy patch in full view. Ah, people come from across continents (and certainly from the adjoining subcontinent) for just that one moment in time. It's always special to spot your "own" leopard and watch in condescending fashion as the news spreads like wildfire and you're surrounded by a dozen jeeps in no time! Think that's all? Not quite. A sloth bear ambled towards a phalanx of vehicles gawking at it and nonchalantly crossed the road just behind our jeep. That's the magic of Yala for you. One of the best days of my life!

Leopard, Yala by Ashok Thampi

Leopard close up by Dr Molina Khanna

We headed on, resisting the temptation to ask for blessings in our birding endeavours at the famous Hindu temple at Kataragama: this temple is visited in large numbers by Buddhists, Christians and Muslims as well. As our guide Thushara put it, Buddhism does not permit you to ask for any material benefits, so if you want to get blessings or favors from the Almighty, just ask for it at the Kataragama temple instead!  Next up was Udawalawe which could be summarized as elephants here, there and everywhere. This national park was created as a catchment area when the Walawe river was dammed and teems with elephants, which seemed remarkably tolerant of our jeeps as they bathed in the numerous water bodies. Crested serpent eagles dotted the landscape and we had clear sightings of the majestic white bellied sea eagle at its nest, the changeable hawk eagle with the wind ruffling its crest, the gray bellied cuckoo and the Indian thicknee.

On to Sinharaja, a World Heritage Site and one of the richest rainforests in the planet in terms of biodiversity and endemic avifauna. We started with a walk just outside the rainforest where a pair of mating crimson fronted barbets and a Legge's flowerpecker with its yellow belly and white throat kicked off the "endemics" endgame. Next morning we went into the rainforest, taking care not just to wear leech socks but to tuck our shirts in (making this school boy like error in Kitulgala had left me with several leeches above my belt line!). The bullfrogs kept up a continuous din and their calls had to be sorted out from bird calls. Sunlight slowly dissipated the thin tendril of mist that cloaked the valley across which we waited. The Sri Lanka hill myna with a single wattle and a different call had to be carefully separated from the southern hill myna also seen in India. How do you spot a bird that doesn't call and doesn't move after it sits: the Sri Lanka wood pigeon is one such, but well worth the search when you see its speckled neck and rose on gray head and neck. And of course finding the Sri Lanka frogmouth is impossible, unless you know it's roosting site, which our guide did: even then it's perfect camouflage still makes it difficult to spot. The elusive Sri Lanka scaly thrush, perfectly camouflaged in the litter of leaves by the path, was next seen and clicked. Then we gate-crashed a party: a mixed flock of white faced starlings, a Malabar trogon, Sri Lanka drongos and (the star attraction) red faced malkohas. The malkoha with its stunning white and red face, is perhaps the only rival to the blue magpie in terms of sheer charisma. If you thought the heat, humidity and leeches were not enough, try crawling through the undergrowth in the slush: that's what I had to do to get a view of a pair of the rare endemic Ashy headed laughingthrushes, which were actually mating. Ah, a kingdom for a camera at that moment! Well worth the scratches and mud: we needed a refreshing dip in the cool rainforest fed rivulet near our resort to cool off. Good thing we saw the 5 foot long water monitor lizard gliding through our bathing spot only the following day!

Red faced Malkoha, Sinharaja by Ashok Thampi

Mouse deer, Sinharaja by Dr Molina Khanna

The Sri Lanka blue magpie is the USP of not just Sinharaja but Sri Lanka birding in general: its blue and chestnut markings, red bill and long blue tail adorn many a poster and brochure. So when we heard its shrill ascending whistle and then photographed a pair of birds, it was a moment that matched our leopard rendezvous at Yala. On the last day we headed to a homestead on the outskirts of the forest. A puddle in their backyard was the stage for a steady pageant of ground dwellers, much like models walking the ramp: spot winged thrush, Indian pitta, slaty legged rail, Indian blue robin, Sri Lanka junglefowl, emerald dove. Finally the queen of the pageant  appeared: a female Sri Lanka spurfowl! And when the extremely shy green billed coucal was sighted and photographed in the open in the adjoining undergrowth, our cup of joy (and list of endemics) overflowed!

Sri Lanka blue magpie, Sinharaja by Ashok Thampi

Slaty legged crake, Sinharaja by Ashok Thampi

Sri Lanka spurfowl female, Sinharaja by Ashok Thampi

Green billed coucal, Sinharaja by Ashok Thampi

Centuries of colonialism, with its attendant timber exploitation and the tea industry, have wiped out much of Sri Lanka's wild habitats. However the country does a remarkably good job in protecting what's left, and smartly uses it's natural wealth to promote a tourist industry that is booming after the end of the war a decade ago. One hopes that the natural treasures of places such as Horton Plains and Sinharaja will be preserved and enhanced for generations to come.  

Time to say goodbye to Serendib; 30 of 33 endemics, several more personal lifers and memories to last a lifetime!