Kokkere Bellur is small village near Maddur (on the highway connecting Bangalore-Mysore). This place is famous for the Pelicans and Painted Storks which come here in 1000s, between the months of December and June. This is not a dedicated bird sanctuary or bird park. Migratory birds have been coming here for 100s of years now. Once you enter the village you will see these birds on every tree guarding their little ones. The villagers are living here with all the birds around them for many years now.
We had been planning to visit this place for a while now, but never managed to do. At last, on the long weekend of April 4th , we planned to visit this place. This is about half a day trip. Since this is on the B’lore – Mysore highway, one can club this with visits to some other tourist spots.
We started after having the festival lunch of Ugadi. After crossing Channapattna, one needs to take a deviation to the left. This is just before Maddur. You will see a sign board “Kokkere Belur 12 KM”. Once you take a left, it is about 20-30 min drive to the village. Like any other tourist spots, we expected lot of sign boards and tourists. But we were surprised to see both of them missing. However once we reached the village we were not disappointed. We could see thousands of Pelicans and Painted Storks everywhere. After some time we saw more tourists coming in.
The villagers mentioned that the Pelicans are there from December – March and Painted storks from April – June. Since we visited in the beginning of April, we were lucky to see both of them. So many birds chirping made a lot of noise and we were wondering how the villagers lived there.
Young boys 7-10 years old volunteer to guide you. The knowledge/data they share is more of what they have seen or heard from their elders. It would take about an hour to see the birds. Apart from this, there is a stream which is not very clean. This will be a good place to have a picnic with lot of fields all around. Also the drive around the village is very rejuvenating. The best time to visit would be early morning or late afternoon (between 4-6PM). As this is not a tourist spot, you will not get anything to eat - except for some chips/biscuits.
We watched the sun set behind the sugar cane fields and started back to Bangalore. On our way back, we stopped at Kamat Lok Ruchi for some North Karnataka food (Jowar Roti). This is one place we don’t miss to stop by whenever we travel on B’lore-Mysore highway.
All in all a very nice and quick trip and also can be taken up without much planning :)
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| Pelicans |
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| Tomatoes in the fields |
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| Painted Storks |
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| Painted Storks |
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| Painted Storks |
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| Painted Stork Guarding her chicks against sun |
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