In Search of Elusive Blood Pheasant

“Chuck kzeeeeeeuuuuuuk cheeu cheeu cheeu”

The ear splitting long high-pitched sound broken the silence of the dawn at the high mountain made our hearts jump. A long wait was about to end. We grabbed each other’s hand tight in excitement. I held my breath but could feel the heart beats faster. My eyelashes were heavier with the tiny drops of mist and eyes were fixed in the direction from where the sound came. I was about to see it for the first time. I was excited, I was anxious…almost flying with excitement . It was too hard to jump inside and keep myself unmoved. Please please please! I was mumbling to myself. Nothing should come in between. We shouldn’t make a single wrong move. The view shouldn’t be covered with fog. I was just praying for a glance of it. And then without making us wait for any longer he appeared … came out of the dense forest of the mountain of North Sikkim. The “Blood pheasant”! Yes!! Truly a Blood pheasant. With a look like blood scattered on his forehead neck breast & belly. A magnificent beauty. An elegant beauty worth waiting for. ‘kzeeeeeuuuuuk cheeu cheeeeu cheeeu’ he kept calling standing on a boulder in open with his head high up.

Me and my friend and our driver cum guide , started in the early morning from our hotel at Lachen when it was still dark, in search of illusive Blood pheasant. The state bird of Sikkim. Once it was the national bird of the independent Kingdom of Sikkim. Out of twelve recognized subspecies the ‘Ithaginis cruentus affinis’ is found in Sikkim region. Recognized by the plumage of the male, especially the amount of blood like spots. With a hope to find this gem we headed towards Thangu which is almost an hour’s driving. Thangu is also the last village at an elevation of 12800 ft, towards indo-tibet border. Just the previous night we had come back from Thangu to Lachen after a session of high-altitude photography of mammals & birds at the high plateau area which is connected to the Tibetan plateau the Roof of the World, beyond the Gurudongmar lake, 17800 ft elevation, no vegetation, thin air. We were all but exhausted after such a hard session of 3 days photography at that challenging cold desert area.

Relieved after coming down at lachen at an elevation of 8500 ft to find ourselves in the middle of greenery everywhere. Next morning we woke up refreshed. All ready for the new venture. Driving all way back along the Lachen chu, one of the two main tributaries of river Teesta, flowing in the opposite direction to converge with the other one, Lachung chu. Somewhere just before reaching Thangu we stopped. We stretched our body & took a look around. Words fall short to describe such beauty. It was a foggy morning in the month of May, bone piercing cold wind. Heavenly scenery all around. The roar of Lachen chu was diminiching as we started climbing up the mountain . Alpine trees were whispering with the wind. Climbing up carrying our heavy weight cameras was a hard job. But we had to reach there before sunrise. On reaching at the spot I was blown away with the stunning view. It always makes us feel good if we can convince ourselves that we have done a tough job. So I convinced myself that we must have climbed almost a thousand ft. Far below the Lachen chu flowing silently. A huge steep scary wall of silvery black rock emerged from behind the thick dwarf vegetation and disappeared beyond the sky, the floor was covered with a carpet of green grass and purple pink primulas. Hide and seek of all of them behind the mist. A perfect habitat for the Blood pheasant. On the first sight of this unbelievably beautiful bird amidst a dreamy land I was feeling like I’s the happiest & luckiest person in the world. Watching them coming out one after another. For a moment I was standing still in astonishment. Coming back to senses we hided ourselves behind boulders trees whatever we found between the birds and us and clicked clicked clicked. We knew they wouldn’t give us endless time but only few moments.

We couldn’t remove our eyes from them even for a moment and followed them until they slowly disappeared into the forest in the backdrop of that rocky wall. In a moment everything was vanished behind the mist. The curtain dropped after the fairy tale play was over. I was so absorbed with the thought that this world is such a beautiful place and nature never stops to amaze us. Happy we were, sad too. We waited for a while with anticipation looking towards their forlorn path, though inside, we knew they were not going to come back. With a deep sigh , we slowly started climbing down , where there was a café. One sweet little secluded wooden café, opened its door just when we came in front of it, hungry & thirsty. We had a cup of hot tea and cookies with a big smile and sparkling eyes. Though we were very happy & excited but no it can never be satisfying! We smiled & nodded our head as if promising that we are gonna come back soon again. Yes, very soon.

About the Writer

“ Doctor madam with the camera”, as fondly called by her colleagues, Dr. Nabamita Ray is a Doctor by profession and a bird -photographer by passion. An adventurous soul Nabamita can be seen cycling up the mountains of North East , trekking down the most difficult terrains of Himalayas, zooming in the black cobra in Tinsukia, Assam or exploring the dense woods of North-East to search for the rare Himalayan birds. She has always been opinionated and worked closely on issues related to conservation of nature and wildlife.