Kanha national park is a beauty of its own with grassy glade, steep rocky slopes and hills. It is the best wildlife spot for wildlife lovers, tourists and animals. The park is sheltered with vast grasslands, bamboo forest and streams stretched over 940 sq.kms.
Kanha is best known as the habitat of the tiger. Kanha National Park was one of the first Project Tiger reserve in India.
Kanha national park was formed in 1955 by merging the two major forests – Hallon and Banjar in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. In 1974, Kanha became a part of Project Tiger, an initiative taken by the Indian Government to save this beautiful animal from extinction. The finest accomplishment of Kanha, though, is the saving of the Swamp Deer from extinction. Together with a surrounding buffer zone of 1009 sq.km and the neighboring 110 sq.km Phen Sanctuary it forms the Kanha Tiger Reserve.
Spotting wild animals is always a matter of luck but Kanha is so rich in wildlife that the odds are titled in your favour. First time visitors are often so keen to spot the larger animals that they overlook the smaller ones. There are 175 varieties of birds in Kanha. So if you happen to be bird watcher, look forward to a full bird show. Most people are keener to meet Kanha’s major attraction, the Tiger
But while on a mission to find a tiger, one can easily catch glimpses of all the grazers, a Porcupine, many Gray Langurs, Mongoose, Hyena, Jungle Cat, even a Leopard. Other wild attractions in this Tiger country include varieties of Deer – the Barasingha, Chital or Spotted Deer, Chousingha, Nilgai, as well as the majestic Gaur or Indian Bison and wild Pig. Bird watching at Kanha National Park is haunting; you are likely to see beauties like the racquet tailed drongo, crimson breasted barbet, crested hawk eagle and golden oriole.
The animals at Kanha are best observed from the elephant back and the open country makes the chance of sightings reasonably good.
The best time to visit is from November to June and is closed for tourists from July to October. Excursions into Kanha National Park are only permitted in the early morning and evening via jeeps.
There are daily flights from New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai to Nagpur. There are also overnight express trains from above major cities to Jabalpur (2.2 hour drive to Kanha) and Nagpur (5 hour drive to Kanha).