Keoladeo (pronounced as Kevladev locally) Bird sanctuary in Bharatpur, Rajasthan is one of the best places to observe migratory birds during winter.
While Feb is probably the best month to have a high count of species including the famous Pelicans, last week of Dec till Jan end is when the park is covered with fog on many days. Coupled with the splendid landscapes and the soft winter light, the park offers one of the best opportunities for honing one's creative photography skills. No wonder Bharatpur is always on the annual trip plans of several birders and bird photographers.
I joined up with 4 of my friends from Pune and embarked on my first trip to this winter wonderland. 3 of us first timers while the other 2 had already done several trips to Bharatpur. Based on the suggestion of the most experienced one in our group, we decided to plan for 4 full days around 2nd week of January.
We flew from Pune to Jaipur and travelled by road to get to Bharatpur.
We booked Iora Guest house (which is not too far away from the main gate) for our stay. There are other good options like Birder's Inn, Sunbird hotel etc which
are slightly more expensive. We hired a couple of electric rickshaws and fixed them for the entire duration of our stay in Bharatpur. The daily tickets to the park etc was booked by our rickshaw driver. Since the light during afternoon is generally not very harsh, we decided to stay put in the park throughout the day. Our homestay would send the breakfast and lunch inside the park which we would have in the canteen area, get some rest and move on with the rest of the day's work.
Since most of the information about Bharatpur is generally available, I am skipping that part. However in case anyone needs any info, I am happy to share the same.
Our main focus of the trip was not to cover lot of specifies of birds or portraits. Instead we wanted to get more of the landscape, get creative images with the fog and the light. Given this objective, I shunned my trusted Nikon 600 mm prime lens and instead rented the Nikon 180-600 Z lens to be paired with my Nikon z8. I also carried my old workhorse Nikon D850 which I paired with my 24-120 kit lens for wide angle images.
I will now let the images take over.
Starting with the park entrance
We saw several
colonies of birds (esp Painted Storks) which were raising their young ones.
The soft morning light provided us with several opportunities to capture several common subjects in all its glory
A spotted deer stag wandering around
Purple Moorhen
A pair of Bar Headed Geese
There are several walkways inside the park which presents unique opportunities to capture some of the common subjects
Purple heron which appeared in a well lit section of the pathway allowing me to underexpose and get this image
Portrait of a Common Kingfisher
The action started picking up once the light improved.
Confrontation between a Purple heron and Pond heron
We moved to other areas of the park to explore and go to see one of the most important denizens of Bharatpur.
Sarus Crane
We then were greeted with some great opportunities for capturing them against the setting sun during the golden hour
Painted Stork silhouette
Cormorant
The next couple of days was quite foggy and provided us with the perfect opportunity for which we had planned the trip
Ducks and storks amidst going about their morning rituals
Cormorant
Postcard from Bharatpur
Bharatpur scape showing some of its denizens basking the foggy morning
And some of the images from the inside walkways with the magical canopies
Nilgai
In monochrome
Jackal with its winter coat
A flock of Pelicans (mix of Rosy and Great White) had arrived a few days before our trip
