Birding on the Banks of the Brahmaputra River

Bird watching is often seen as a hobby for nerds with beards, wearing goat woollen socks in their slippers. But during our travels last years, we experienced that many of these stereotypes are outdated. Off course, bird watching is still mainly a male thing, but once in a while we also meet female bird watchers, or couples. The percentage of beardy people isn’t higher than elsewhere in society and we didn’t see bird watchers with goat woollen socks in slippers yet. But what is true, is the fact that most bird watchers have an interest in nature and that they like to spend time in green and quiet environments. The accent lies on tracing and observing birds, but most bird watchers also have a healthy interest in other nature things like butterflies, insects, flora, etc.

The so-called ‘twitchers’ and ‘listers’ are a subcategory of bird watchers; people who like to extend their bird list as much as possible. These people sometimes have an agreement with their employer that they can leave their work in case a rare or special bird is detected on the other side of their country. If you want to see as much birds as possible during your holiday, you can consider booking a bird watching holiday at a company like Bird Tours Asia or Bird Quest, both specialised in birding trips. But these holidays don’t come cheap. Expect to pay around € 5000 per person for a 16-18 day trip to Asia! That is not the kind of bird watching we like, because you can do exactly the same kind of trip all by yourself for a lot less money. And that is much more fun because you track and trace the birds all by yourself, without some kind of guide pointing out the birds to you. Off course, you probably won’t see the number of birds as the birding agencies do. So, not really an option for us, but a great solution for people who do not want or dare to travel individually.

We are at the moment on Fraser’s Hill, one of the three main bird watching areas on the Malayan Peninsular. Kuala Selangor is often visited for the mangrove birds, Taman Negara for the lowlands rainforest birds and Fraser’s Hill for the highland birds. This former colonial hill station is blessed with more than 200 resident bird species and around 60 migratory species. Before we visit a popular birding area, we often try to find trip reports on the internet to get an idea about the kinds of birds that can be found in the area. Some trip reports also provide trail details and sometimes even maps. In a trip report of one of the major bird watching agencies, we read that they saw on Fraser’s Hill almost a hundred different species in only four days. For a moment we were a little bit jealous, but when we realised that these people do everything to see the bird, like using audio tapes with bird sounds to entice them, the jealousy slipped away. That’s not the type of bird watching we practice. We just want to walk the trails and see what we see. If we don’t see some specific species, than it’s at most a pity but absolutely no disaster.

As soon as we arrived in picturesque Fraser’s Hill, some of the more common seen species showed themselves very well in the centre of the village. But, when we went for an afternoon walk in the jungle, it was almost grisly quiet. We realised soon that we really have to ‘work’ hard in Fraser’s Hill to see the more special and shy species. And that means moving slowly and concentrated through the jungle, searching for little movements in the often thick bushes and trees. The spectacular Fire-tufted Barbet is described in many trip reports as a common bird in Fraser’s Hill, but after a long day of bird watching, we unfortunately didn’t see it. But the environment is beautiful, so even without seeing a lot of birds, we still have a great time. The following days, things changed. We were getting more used to bird watching in Fraser’s Hill, and slowly birds showed themselves. After four days of bird watching, we saw fifty-five different species, including different species of Barbet, Broadbills, the beautiful Red-bearded Bee-eater and even the elusive Malayan Whistling Thrush and Lesser Shortwing.

Fraser’s Hill is a great environment if you like nature and hiking. The area has some great trails and even walking over the paved roads, which are very quiet, especially outside the weekend, is very nice. You will regularly see wildlife; not only colourful birds, but also a lot of monkeys like different sorts of Leave Monkeys and even Siamangs. Besides that, the jungle contains a lot of insects, squirrels and reptiles like the flying lizards. So, we have a great time in Fraser’s Hill. Everyday we see more and more different bird species. Like we said, it is not very easy, but it is absolutely enjoyable.

Assam Tea Gardens

It was only after I had been to Assam that I actually walked into a tea gardens of the North East, although I had seen and admired many from outside. It was an enchanting day. The air smelled fresh and I breathed in a deep lungful. I could immediately make out the difference in the air from the polluted air of Guwahati. There exuded an all-pervading peace with light calls of birds floating from the trees.

The tea bushes are about 3 feet in height with an even surface from the top of which the pluckers pluck the tea leaves. This is known as the plucking table which I learnt from the Assamesse. Only the light-green shoots that appear on top of the branches of the tea bush are plucked and not the older dark-green leaves which are there to nourish the bush. The shoots comprising of two leaves and a bud are tender and soft to the touch. I picked one and looked closely and found to my surprise that the bud is actually a very tender rolled-up leaf, the newest one, which too would open up if left to itself.

Tall slender trees grew here and there between the tea bushes at regular intervals, spreading their slender leaf-laden branches over the bushes. These are the shade trees which provide shade to the tea bushes as can be seen by the play of sunlight and shadow over the bushes. The foliage of a shade tree is never thick but very light so that sunlight can easily reach the bushes. Shade trees not only provide shade but also provide essential nutrients to the soil and there are specific varieties of trees from which the shade trees are chosen.

The lay of the land in a tea garden is undulating (hilly in some regions) so that excess rainwater or irrigation water does not remain standing at the roots but flows away after watering the soil since the soil should be well-drained. There are roadways through the gardens, the main arterial roads are wide enough for a motorcar and the rest can be traversed on foot or on a motorcycle which the Managers and Assistant Managers use for their daily work.

The round of plucking in a garden is done in such a way that the pluckers pluck through the garden and come round to the same table after a gap of 7 days (gap may vary due to various factors) by which time tender shoots spring up again and are ready to be plucked. The pluckers are all women while men do other jobs like spraying disinfectant, weedicide, preparing the ground for new plantation, supervisory jobs etc. I watched a while as the women plucked, their expert fingers flying over the bush and filling the baskets slung on their backs by a strap across their foreheads. It seems this is hard work and needs tough hands as the branches can often cut the hands and hence older women can pluck a greater load as their hands have been toughened with long years of work. I moved away and after some time noticed that the women had stopped work and were standing together and looking at me.

The security man pointed out a small white flower that nestled among the bushes and he told me that tea bushes also bear flowers but the flowers are very few and far-between. He said that tea bushes are commonly grown from cuttings (seedlings) which produces bushes much faster but they can also be grown from seeds which would take several years. Left to itself, a tea bush will grow into a big sturdy tree and produce seeds but for tea production, they must be pruned and trained to form many-branched low bushes. A tea bush loses its economic productivity after 40 or 50 years and then that part of the garden is uprooted and re-planted. The uprooted tea bushes are often made into lovely low tables by local artisans that fetch a good price in the market. The uprooted tea bush is turned over so that the branches form the many legs of the table and a tabletop is placed on the upturned thick root. The table is highly polished and given finishing touches until it shines.

Each pluckers load of tea leaves are measured and written down on a register and they are paid accordingly every fortnight. The load of tea leaves are taken to the factory and there the green leaves are turned into the tea we brew.

This factory produces CTC tea (Crush-Tear-Curl), which is the most common form of tea worldwide. I wandered through the factory where I learnt the various stages of tea processing. In a nutshell, the process goes something like this. The leaves are first withered (dried) in a large closed room like a compartment which has big fans blowing hot air over the leaves. After withering, in another large room the leaves are put through a giant machine having cylindrical drums with teeth that crush, tear and curl the leaves. The crushed leaves smell like any other crushed green leaves from other trees and certainly nothing like tea. This crushed powder is then spread out in a thin layer in big patches on the floor of another large room where the grainy powder slowly dries and turns brown. At given intervals labourers brush the patches and turn over the powder to aid better drying.

This room exudes the heady aroma of freshly made tea. This brown grainy powder is dried some more in a large machine, graded into different sized grains and is then packed in big wooden crates. The tea is now ready to be brewed.

The Chinese are the earliest tea-drinkers. Legend has it that in 2737 B.C., the Chinese Emperor Shen Nung was on a journey and he was boiling water to drink over an open fire as he believed that drinking water should always be boiled for good health. Some leaves from a nearby Camellia Sinensis plant (botanical name of tea plant) floated into the pot. The Emperor drank the brew and was very impressed. He declared that it gave one "vigor of body, contentment of mind, and determination of purpose". The brew that the Emperor unwittingly made that day is second only to water in worldwide consumption today. Tea was introduced to India by the British, who set up productive plantations in colonial India where the climate and soil were suitable.

Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary

A visit to Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary is seen as one of the absolute highlights of every visit to Assam. Pobitora is a Wildlife Sanctuary, where visitors are treated on trumpeting elephants, bands of rhinoceros, beautiful birds, wild buffalos and maybe even an encounter with the legendary wild boar, which moves like a shadow through the undergrowth of the forest. So, this vast area of dry woodlands, with its open areas and small lakes is a must-see attraction in the Assam.

For most travellers, a visit to Pobitora starts with the journey to the Marigaon district of the state of Assam in India.). This is the most convenient base for independent trips to the national park. This is also the place where you can arrange your jeep safari at one of the many agencies or individual drivers. I took the elephant safari. Travellers with a higher budget might choose to stay at Pobitora Village Hotel, and upmarket resort close to the entrance of the park. I decided to stay in a bamboo cottage at Pobitora Village Hotel. At half past three in the evening, the gate of the park opened for me. It was time to start enjoying all the beauty that the park had in store for us.

Eventually, I did see a lot during our safari. The first group of animals that makes us always happy when we see them is the birds. I saw among other birds loads of black kite, black drongo, Indian pond heron, Chestnut-tailed

Starling and of course also the hill myna. I also saw groups of rhino that cooled themselves in the swamp. I was also very happy with the different sightings of the wild elephant which are seldom seen.

The park still has a healthy rhino population which makes a sighting of an rhino in Pobitora substantial. It is fabulous to see these huge animals on just a few metres from the our elephant.

After enjoying the rhino fight for twenty minutes, we decided to ride back to the park entrance. We were in the park already for almost two hours. Most jeeps left the park already, because most visitors only book a tour an hour, based on the assumption that there isn’t a lot to see in the park during the hottest hours of the day.

But we always say: “you definitely see more in the park, than you see in your hotel room”, and that’s why we always try to stay as long as possible. And that theory paid off today. On the way back to the park entrance I saw a wild boars feasting in the muck. My lucky moment came when he decided to ‘use the toilet’ which was the perfect opportunity to make a picture of him. The sighting was tremendous! We looked at each other satisfied; a great safari ended with a fabulous climax.