Western Ghats Fixed Departure Birding Tour

We will start our journey at Kerala's seaside town of Kochi. When you land in Kochi, our driver or tour guide will pick you up and take you to Thattekkad. The trip is around 70 kilometres long and takes up to two hours.

Around midday, we arrive at the pre-booked hotel in Thattekad, and after a little pause for food and rest, we will start our day of birding. Undoubtedly, Thattekkad is the top birding hotspot in South India. For you to flourish from the first four days of birding in the Western Ghats as you begin the journey, we purposefully put them at the beginning of our schedule.

The Thattekkad Bird Sanctuary, home to over 322 kinds of birds, is where we start our day of birding. If time allows, we may also go farther into the sanctuary.

Thattekkad has the bonus of presenting many opportunities for night birding as well. Therefore, those enthusiasts eager for extra time in the field may fit in some midnight birding at the end of the day. After this, have a delicious dinner and a night's rest at the hotel.

Between the two branches of the Periyar, Kerala's largest river, is the 25-square kilometre Thattekad Bird Sanctuary, a lowland forest. It is Kerala's oldest bird sanctuary, and it remains the most excellent spot to watch many migratory and unique Western Ghats species. This is why we will be birdwatching at Thattekkad Bird Sanctuary for three full consecutive days.

According to our years of monitoring Thattekad, these three days are often jam-packed with bird observations. This area's most frequently observed birds include the Malabar Grey Hornbill, White-bellied Woodpecker, Heart-spotted Woodpecker, White-bellied Treepie, and Spot-bellied Eagle-Owl. Other common species include the Red Spurfowl, Rufous Babbler, Brown-breasted Flycatcher, White-bellied Flycatcher, Blue-tailed Flycatcher, and Rusty-tailed Flycatcher.

Grey-headed Bulbul and Wayanad Laughing Thrush are two of the most enigmatic species, yet birding routes near Urulanthanni at the further end of the bird sanctuary offer a few valued glimpses of these two beauties.

We will explore the woods at night for the numerous nightjars, frogmouths, and owls. Hence, we will keep up this hectic birding schedule for three days, but each day we will visit various areas and birding paths to fully cover the Thattekkad Bird Sanctuary. After such wild birding tours, you will get a super tasty lunch and dinner at the resort.

We will leave early in the morning to travel the two hours to Munnar, which is 65 kilometres from Thattekad and will travel far into the Western Ghats mountains throughout the journey. At a height of around 1600 meters above mean sea level, Munnar is a well-known hill station and a popular tourist destination. Its environment is covered in lush green tea plantations, which give it a surrealistic beauty.

Many Western Ghats bird species also thrive in this environment, and they may be seen in some of the wildlife sanctuaries and national parks surrounding Munnar, including Eravikulam, Anamudi, and Pampadum Shola parks.

Sholas are sparse patches of highland forest that naturally occur and are divided by open grass spaces. Exciting bird species occur in the forests and grasslands of Munnar, including the Nilgiri Wood Pigeon, Nilgiri Flycatcher, Black and Orange Flycatcher, Grey-breasted Laughing Thrush, White-bellied Shortwing, Nilgiri Pipit, Painted Bushquail, and many others.

Additionally, we often observe some of the birds found in Thattekkad, allowing us to constantly photograph these beautiful feathered treasures.

We will do this birding program in and around Munnar for two days. Then once again, you will enjoy the lunchtime picnics. Lastly, dinner and an overnight stay in a Munnar hotel.

In the morning, we will go to Ooty from Munnar. It is a long trip of more than 200 km across the constantly shifting hilly scenery, including the Western Ghats' rain-shadow areas. These areas are on the eastern side of the mountains and receive less precipitation than the western side. We will make a pit break to go bird-watching for a few hours at one of these areas named Chinnar.

Between the Deccan Plateau and the Western Ghats lies the Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary. In this sanctuary's thorny scrub woodland and meadows, there are roughly 150 kinds of birds from 40 different families.

After a productive day of birding in Chinnar, we will proceed by cab to Ooty, where we will arrive in the late afternoon or evening, and you can relax in the hotel for dinner and the night.

Our first fuel stop in Tamil Nadu is at Ooty. Do you know that Ooty is famously known as the "Blue Mountains of India?" It is a hill station at a height of 2240 meters, and people go there in enormous numbers because of its stunning location in the Nilgiri Hills, surrounded by lush green tea plants.

We will begin our morning by birdwatching briefly in and around Ooty before packing up and departing for Masinagudi, located approximately 30 miles distant.

Masinagudi, a part of the Mudumalai National Park, is a tiger reserve and wildlife sanctuary well-known for its verdant woodlands. Our afternoon is primarily devoted to bird watching in Mudumalai National Park.

Our national birds, Peacock, Brown Dove, Spotted Babbler, Green Pigeons, Grey Jungle Fowl, Red Spurfowl, White-cheeked Barbet, Malabar Whistling Thrush, and several other species are among our priorities for Mudumalai. Additionally, we look out for predators, including eagles, hawks, buzzards, harriers, falcons, and king vultures. And in the late evening, we will walk to look for owls and nightjars. At Masinagudi, you will enjoy a delicious dinner and spend the night.

Our Western Ghats' unique birding adventure ends on this day. We will take advantage of it by birdwatching early in the morning near Masinagudi. Then we will pack everything and take you to the airport in Coimbatore or Kochi for your next flight.

Hope you will enjoy this Western Ghats birding tour with us!