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Category: INDIA
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MAGNOLI VALLEY & LIST INDIA

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00o00´S/00o00´W, ha, alpine foothills, m 
PROTECTED/REGISTERED STATUS? 
February-March (NAINITAL 11.02.94 and MAGNOLI VALLEY 13.02.94)

 

Birding Site Guide

 

From Nainital, drive up hill and continue for 19 kilometres. There is a road sign which says "KALADHUNG 1 Km", but this is not accurate and appears to have been vandalised. A few hundred yards further on there are a number of chai stalls on the roadside, and immediately beyond them there is a pink building with gates. To the side of this is the start of the footpath. Mangoli Valley is the area behind the chai stalls, and not the actual valley which drops down behind the school. As you follow the path over the hill, check the hillside for Black-naped Green Woodpecker as we found half a dozen or more here, and they were very approachable for photographs. Along this path was quiet, but very interesting and brought us some new birds such as the woodpeckers, Grey-Faced Leaf Warbler, Himalayan Treepie, and Lammergier Take the small path down to the road, and then continue down passed the school, and begin to drop down into the valley. There is a stream that runs down hill and along the valley bottom but the going here is very hard and even worse on the way back up. This was the hardest thing we did during our whole visit, and for the time it took us, it is questionable whether it was worth doing. As far as the few houses it was quite reasonable, and close by we found the Himalayan Greenfinches, Alpine Swifts, Slaty-backed Forktail and Blue-Throated Barbet. Much lower down, our only new birds were Grey-Crowned Pygmy Woodpecker, and Ashy Drongo, although we had a number of butterflies which we didn't see again: Common Sailor, Blue Pansy and Yellow Pansy plus a couple we haven't named. If you do go down to the valley bottom, then you need to allow a full day. 


Species seen 





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Author: BSG and Geof Grafton

 

 

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