After spending a wonderful day at the Salt Desert in Dhordo, we started towards Ahmedabad in the afternoon. On the way, we stopped at a marsh that spread on both sides of the highway. There we found several Common Pochards, Northern Shovelers, Little Grebe, Common Coots, Great White Pelicans, some Little Egrets, and a Eurasian Marsh Harrier.

Somewhere close to Ahmedabad, I found my first Yellow-Wattled Lapwings at a construction site.

Ahmedabad

We reached Ahmedabad late at night and the next morning we left for Thol Bird Sanctuary.

Thol Bird Sanctuary

The first bird I saw at Thol was a much-awaited one – Spot-breasted Fantail.

Within a few minutes of seeing the Fantail, I found another much-awaited species – Red-Collared Dove. Though it is a fairly common dove, I had never seen it properly before. This one also didn’t stay for long but, at least it gave me a decent record shot.

Near the entrance, I found a Clamorous Reed Warbler and a Sulphur-Bellied Warbler both of which were new additions to my list. I took turns photographing both of them. The Reed Warbler flew off within a minute, the Sulphur-Bellied Warbler, who kept scaling up and down the length of a signboard, however, gave me some interesting shots.

Next up, I found a White-Browed Fantail (another new addition) by the side of the trail I was following.

There was a waterhole inside the dense tree cover where I could see a lot of bird activity. I found an opening and tried photographing the birds present there, but it was very dark – just enough to see the birds and identify them. There was a Spot-Breasted Fantail, a Lesser Whitethroat, a Common Chiffchaff. I found a couple of Indian Robins, a Red-Breasted Flycatcher, and another Sulphur-Bellied Warbler in the vicinity.

By then, we were getting a bit late because we planned on reaching Udaipur by the end of the day. So, we said goodbye to Thol and to Ahmedabad and headed towards our next destination.

Udaipur

There was not much birding at Udaipur except a long-awaited Brooks’s Leaf Warbler and a fairly common Yellow-Throated Sparrow, that I saw at Moti Magri.

Since there wasn’t much to see in Udaipur, we left for Chittorgarh in the evening.

Chittorgarh

The Chittorgarh Fort is the largest fort in India, covering an area of roughly 700 acres.

There were a lot of birds inside the fort, but time was our enemy and so I couldn’t spend much time birding. I found another Sulphur-Bellied Warbler there along with a White-Capped Bunting and a few Gray-Breasted Prinias.

After some sightseeing inside the fort, we left Chittorgarh and headed towards our next destination – Tal Chhapar.

Ajmer

On the way to Tal Chhapar, we stopped for a coffee break at Ajmer. We found a nice cafe there, overlooking Anasagar Lake. There, I got the opportunity to photograph a few Black-Headed Gulls.

Tal Chhapar, Churu

We reached Churu pretty late and as there are not a lot of hotels in Tal Chhapar, we decided to go to Salasar instead to spend the night. We got up early the next morning, went to the Salasar Balaji Temple, and left for Tal Chhapar Black Buck Sanctuary which is only an hour drive from there.

Tal Chhapar Black Buck Sanctuary

Even before entering the sanctuary, we were already amazed by the sight of hundreds of Indian Blackbucks, feeding in the golden grasslands of Tal Chappar.

Right outside the sanctuary, I found my first Great Gray Shrike.

After photographing the Shrike I found a flock of Rosy Starlings on a dead tree nearby. They were sitting against the light so, I couldn’t get decent shots of them.

After that, we entered the sanctuary and were greeted by a couple of Blackbucks and another Great Gray Shrike.

There we encountered a very curious male Blackbuck who kept on poking his snout in my lens hood! Our guess was that it was an old individual and was thus very friendly.

Within a few minutes of this wonderful encounter, I found a large flock of Greater Short-toed Larks a bit far off and a female Common Kestrel.

We spent some more time inside and were getting very frustrated by the lack of Raptor Activity when my dad spotted a few Chestnut-bellied Sandgrouses. After spending some time hopelessly trying to photograph the grouse, we left the sanctuary.

Besides the Blackbuck encounter, Tal Chhapar was mostly a disappointment. I expected a lot of raptor activity and was really looking forward to finding some Laggar Falcons, which are the area’s specialty, but except a few female Kestrels, I found pretty much no raptors at all.

I later found out that all these birds are mostly found in the Gaushala area of the village and are not as common in the sanctuary. I guess now that gives me a reason to go back there again.

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Checklist

and the main highlights of the day for me were the two fantails – Spot-Breasted Fantail and White-Browed Fantail!

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Also checkout – Rann Roadies – Part 1 – Phillaur to Khichan
Rann Roadies – Part 2 – Jodhpur to Dholavira
Rann Roadies – Part 3 – Bhuj and the White Rann

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^__ Thank you for reading ^__

~Arjun Basandrai