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 Location:
Bharatpur, Rajasthan.
Coverage Area : 232 sq. Kms.
Main Attractions: Spoon Bills
Best Time To Visit : The Keoladeo National Park is open
throughout the year. August-October is the breeding season, so the
birds are best left alone then. The best season for visiting this place
is between October to February when the migratory birds come to
visit this park from all over the globe.
Accommodation : There are rest houses, lodges, dormitories
and hotels. Rajasthan Tourism provides good accommodation at its
hotel, 'Saras'. Inside the park, the Bharatpur Forest Lodge is
maintained by the ITDC. Shanti Kuteer, Circuit House, Dak Bungalow
are also good for a comfortable stay. Park Palace, Govind Niwas and
the Tourist complex are the other choices. Almost all the houses around
the park lend out one or two rooms to visitors. These are cheap and
provide comfortable stay.
 Keoladeo
Ghana National Park, one of the most spectacular bird sanctuaries in
India, nesting indigenous water- birds as well as migratory water birds
and water side birds. It is also inhabited by sambar, chital, nilgai and
boar. More than 300 species of birds are found in this small park of 29
sq. km. of which 11 sq. km. are marshes and the rest scrubland and
grassland. Keoladeo, the name derives from an ancient Hindu temple,
devoted to Lord Shiva, which stands at the centre of the park. 'Ghana'
means dense, referring to the thick forest, which used to cover the
area. While many of India's parks have been developed from the hunting
preserves of princely India, Keoladeo Ghana is perhaps the only case
where the habitat has been created by a maharaja. In earlier times,
Bharatpur town used to be flooded regularly every monsoon. In 1760, an
earthern dam (Ajan Dam) was constructed, to save the town, from this
annual vagary of nature. The depression created by extraction of soil
for the dam was cleared and this became the Keoladeo lake. At the
beginning of this century, this lake was developed, and was divided into
several portions. A system of small dams, dykes, sluice gates, etc., was
created to control water level in different sections. This became the
hunting preserve of the Bharatpur royalty, and one of the best duck -
shooting wetlands in the world. Hunting was prohibited by mid-60s. The
area was declared a national park on 10 March 1982, and accepted as a
World Heritage Site in December 1985.
Fauna
:
Over
350 species of birds find a refuge in the 29 sq km of shallow lakes and
woodland, which makes up the park. A third of them are migrants, many of
whom spend their winters in Bharatpur, before returning to their
breeding grounds, as far away as Siberia and Central Asia. Migratory
birds at Keoladeo include, as large a bird as Dalmatian pelican, which
is slightly less than two meters, and as small a bird as Siberian disky
leaf warbler, which is the size of a finger.
Other migrants include several species of cranes, pelicans, geese,
ducks, eagles, hawks, shanks, stints, wagtails, warblers, wheatears,
flycatchers, buntings, larks and pipits, etc. But of all the migrants,
the most sought after is the Siberian Crane or the great white crane,
which migrates to this site every year, covering a distance of more than
half the globe. These birds, numbering only a few hundred, are on the
verge of extinction. It is birds from the western race of the species,
that visit Keoladeo, migrating from the Ob river basin region, in the
Aral mountains, in Siberia via Afghanistan and Pakistan. There are only
two wintering places, left for this extremely rare species.One is in
Feredunkenar in Iran, and the other is Keoladeo Ghana. The journey to
Bharatpur takes them 6,400 kms from their breeding grounds, in Siberia.
They arrive in December and stay till early March. Unlike Indian cranes,
the Siberian crane is entirely vegetarian. It feeds on underground
aquatic roots and tubers in loose flocks of five or six
Arrival
Information :
--
By Rail : Bharatpur has its own railway stations with many major
trains halting here.
-- By Air : The nearest airport is that of Agra.
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By Road :
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Nearby Excursions :
--- Government Museum, Bharatpur which gives a glimpse of past splendour.
--- Just 32 kms from Bharatpur, is the Deeg Palace. This strong and
massive fort was the summer resort of
the rulers of Bharatpur and has many palaces and gardens.
-- Nearby Cities : Bharatpur
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Duration:
15 days
Duration:
15 days
