Wildlife in West Bengal

The Sunderbans offer an adventurous wildlife tour with its largest estuarine delta in the world and the biggest colony of the Royal Bengal Tigers. This national park is spread out over an area of 16,500sq km in the prostrate delta towards the mouth of the Ganga. These evergreen mangrove forests are home to many rivers and water channels.

The core area of the Sunderbans Wildlife Sanctuary in West Bengal, India consists of 1330 square kilometers of marshland. This core area of the Sunderbans wildlife park is home to more than 200 Royal Bengal Tigers. The entire Sunderbans wildlife sanctuary is spread over an area 2,608 square kilometers including the core area and the buffer zone. Most of the tigers at these mangrove forests are excellent swimmers. This wildlife sanctuary also has a considerable population of crocodiles, the Ridley Sea Truffle and the Gangetic Dolphin.

The Sunderbans wildlife sanctuary offers a habitat for a variety of reptilian fauna such as the River Terrapin, Monitor lizard, Water monitor and the Indian python. The water creeks at the Sunderbans wildlife sanctuary are breeding grounds for quite a few species of fish. You can spot crabs and other mollusks during your tours to the Sunderbans wildlife sanctuary.

The flora and fauna at the Sunderbans wildlife sanctuary exists in an extremely tropical climate.
Wildlife tours to this huge swampy marshland can be the most amazing experience as this wildlife park is not like the normal wildlife sanctuaries. The area has dense undergrowth and you get to experience the genuine ‘deep forest safari’.

During your wildlife tours you travel around the Sunderbans wildlife sanctuary in a launch. The Sunderban delta got its name from the fact that the area is totally covered with mangrove trees that are popularly known as the Sundari trees. Besides the mangrove trees there are other trees such as the Dhundal, Passur, Genwa, Garjan and Kankra.