Lava and Latpanchar: hornbill tourism and much more

A decade ago, an article by noted birders Bikram Grewal and Sumit Sen about Lava, “India's hottest birding mile", had imprinted itself indelibly in my memory. So when a chance came up to join a birding group there, I wasted no time in signing up and drooled over the prospect of encountering richly coloured rarities that you could literally stumble over in a short span of time.

We landed in Bagdogra and drove to Sevoke station where the Teesta leaves the hills, the chaotic traffic and toxic air of Siliguri giving way to verdant forests of the Mahananda Wildlife Sanctuary. An unplanned “lunch break”in the forest adjoining Sevoke railway station had an enthralling “special" item on the birding menu: the tiny collared falconet, whose own staple diet is butterflies and other insects. India’s tiniest raptor lorded over the tiny station atop a pole, much like a pompous station master would. Though the 3 pm hour was not the best for birding, four species of barbets and an Oriental pied hornbill were among the 20 odd species that kept us satiated till tea time.

Lava at 2040 m, on the outskirts of Neora Valley National Park, was our overnight halt: next morning we breakfasted at Chaudaferi camp where we photographed black-faced and chestnut-crowned laughingthrushes gobbling up bread crumbs in bright sunlight. On the way, a hoary-throated barwing and a dark-breasted rosefinch were both lifers for me. After a sighting of the wonderfully aptly named golden bush robin, we turned east towards Kolakham. The rufous-naped yuhinas had taken over the forest, much like pigeons take over our cities. Red-headed bullfinches are poorly named: it’s the black and white on their bodies that makes a true fashion statement. A group of bar-throated sivas (formerly chestnut-tailed minlas) posed for long on the road, of all places, busily foraging in the sand. Ever tried differentiating the rare rufous-breasted bush robin from the commoner blue-fronted redstart? Extension of the belly orange all the way up to the chin is seen in the former: but chaos reigns when the two are seen one after the other!

The road to Algarah from Lava, India's hottest birding mile, was sadly being widened into a two lane highway, given the ongoing security situation and its proximity to the Chinese border: sadly the wonderfully described birding spots on it were the collateral damage. The Lava-Rishob road finally provided the perfect habitat for Himalayan birding: narrow, undisturbed and potholed with dense forest canopy on both sides. And sure enough the lifers flowed. A rufous-throated wren-babbler was heard and then photographed from close range, while the pygmy wren-babbler waited at roadside and then hurriedly dashed across the road. Five Himalayan cutias on a single mossy tree followed! Nothing  can beat seeing these “cute", incredibly charismatic moss lovers. The nominations for best tiny bird of the day went to the wren-babbler, the luridly “golden” golden babbler, the unmistakable black-faced warbler and the  impossibly cute black-throated parrotbill. And the Oscar went to.......

Sunrise on Mount Khanchendzonga promised a packed birding day ahead as we set off from Kolakham along Raset trail. When that same morning sunlight fell on a pair of male scarlet finches, ah! Next to keep up its appointment at the sunlight photo studio was the fire-tailed sunbird. The booming decrescendo call of a pair of huge bay woodpeckers kept us engrossed with craning necks as they moved from tree to tree. Sightings of scimitar-babblers make birders faintly delirious: the slender-billed with its near semi-circular bill was followed by the even rarer coral-billed scimitar babbler with its glowing reddish-orange bill. When the sun went behind a cloud, the white-gorgeted flycatcher’s gorget shone like a beacon in the undergrowth. A mixed hunting party of red-tailed minlas, yellow-cheeked tits, bar-throated sivas and a speckled piculet left us with eye strain trying to focus on one, then the other. Three red-faced liocichla showed themselves for just a second, just enough time for a couple of our photographers to squeeze off a frame.

Birding groups generally consist of two species: the photographers (with their big SLR lenses) and birders (like me, pretending that photography dilutes the joy of birding but constantly envying the superb images on others’ camera screens over their shoulder). So it was a bit of a David vs Goliath situation when my bridge camera managed, most fortuitously, to take images of two rare undergrowth skulkers, the rufous-throated wren-babbler and the grey-throated babbler!

You must have heard of boom towns triggered by gold mining, but a hornbill boom town? That’s what Latpanchar, our next destination at an altitude of 1400 m, had become. From a sleepy unheard of hamlet, reports of easy to sight rufous-necked hornbills had resulted in a mushrooming of homestays, each with a big hornbill photo as its signboard. Morning birding duly resulted in sightings of a hornbill pair within ten minutes. Apparently hordes of photographers wait opposite nests for the dream photo during nesting season in April: a definite economic incentive to preserve the hornbills and the large trees on which they depend to nest. I wondered about the collateral damage of hornbill tourism on the forest and how many years the hornbills would continue to nest here undisturbed.

Subsequent desert after the main meal consisted of a plethora of lower altitude specialists, chief of which were the lovely green magpie, the rare sapphire flycatcher and the long-tailed broadbill. A rusty-cheeked scimitar babbler kept up its two toned call for a while.  A pair of slaty-backed forktails scrambled on our approaching their stream. So near was the call of the tiny slaty-bellied tesia, yet so far was it from being seen. An Asian barred owlet turned its head a full 180 degrees to glower at us before flying off. Will Latpanchar become an international hornbill birding destination or will the hornbills lose their home? The next generation will tell us.

North Bengal’s treasures are in peril though. Lava town is expanding in all directions and the dense forest we birded in, outside the small Neora Valley National Park, is up for grabs by settlers and developers. Mahananda is a wildlife sanctuary only in name with no entrance check post, no forest department patrolling and big settlements such as Latpanchar within. Between road widening in the name of security and clearing of forest land in the name of development, these forests may not remain for another generation.

The last day was spent at Sukna and Rongtong in the Mahananda wildlife sanctuary, a short drive north from the noise and pollution of Siliguri. The road was parallel to the iconic Darjeeling mountain railroad, and we wondered whether we should have taken the train. Obviously the train would not have stopped repeatedly for our pre-breakfast birding, lower altitude species tumbling out of the forest barely before the earlier one was identified. Two crested goshawks banked above in unison, while a Himalayan buzzard perched for long in bright sunlight.

Memories to last a lifetime!

Asian barred owlet

Bar-throated siva

Bay woodpecker

Black-faced laughingthrush

Chestnut-crowned laughingthrush

Collared falconet- India's smallest raptor

Coral-billed scimitar babbler

Lava forest

Ideal birding road Lava-Rishob

View of Lava from Kolakham

Fire-tailed sunbird

Golden-throated barbet

Green-tailed sunbird

Grey-cheeked warbler

Grey-throated babbler

Himalayan buzzard

Himalayan cutia

View of Lava from Rishob

Long-tailed shrike

Rufous sibia

Rufous-necked hornbill female

Rufous-necked hornbill male

Rufous-throated wren babbler

Rufous-vented yuhina

Rusty-cheeked scimitar babbler

Scarlet finch male and female

Shikra with a kill

Sikkim (brown-throated treecreeper)

Slaty-backed forktail

Striated bulbul

White-rumped shama

White-tailed nuthatch