Best time to visit

Best time to visit Kanha national park varies as per visitor's objective behind the trip. Different tourists have different objective behind there trip like some visitors are undertaking tour for wildlife photography, for family time & fun, for honeymoon, for relaxation & peace etc. If we go further deep in wildlife photography, tourists have different chapters for photography. Some photographers want to do birds photography, some want sloth bear photography, most of them want to do tiger photography, some people want just to photograph landscape and natural beauty of forest. According to different objectives, best time to visit varies. Here in Kanha national park, core zones are open from October to June month where as buffer safari zones are open throughout the year.

If you are forest lover and like to see lush green jungle with nice climatic condition, then our suggest is to visit Kanha national park from mid October to January month. Large number of tourists visit this forest in this period to photography lush green forest, safari trails & do birding. In this time, deers & antelope skin color glows which means they are more eye-catchy and pictures will be more beautiful in compare to photographs taken in summers. During summers season, their skin color becomes dull thus they also not appears so good in summer photography. Due to festival season, school holidays, large number of domestic tourists prefers to visit wildlife destinations like Kanha tiger reserve thus advance safari booking is highly recommended.

Period of December to February is very good for family holidays. Although December is peak winter period but still large number of migratory birds use to visit India and thus we can enjoy good birding & photography. Here December last week (24Dec to 02Jan) is a peak season time with lot of rush so try to avoid this time as safari tickets often get sold out & resorts increases their tariff by 20% to 30% and over crowding of leisure tourists causes problems. It is also the time of fog in North India, causing delay in flights & trains. Still it offers chance of some best jungle photography in early morning hours with combination of golden sun rays, fog & forest combination. In this time, temperature ranges from 05 to 20 Deg.Cel. Morning will be of chilling experience. It is comparatively easy to get desired number of safari tickets in desired safari zones, during months of January & February.

Best time for tiger photography with average probability is from Feb-March when vegetation is still green and temperature is moderate due to which we have more time in hand for photography. During this period, we can get those photographs in which tiger/s can be seen in various moods in different poses with more glowing coat and backdrop of green forest. Summer photography offers some routine poses like sitting in waterhole, with half of body underwater, for hours in same pose. Their movements, coat glow also remains dull in summers.

If you are looking for that period of safari season when tiger sighting probability will be high then try to visit from April to mid of June. In this period, due to peak summer season, presence of heat waves, small water holes get dryed thus it becomes easy to predict the tigers movement. This is the general reason why summers is considered as hight probability period for tiger sighting and photography. Landscape of Kanha tiger reserve is special, different from nearby Bandhavgarh and Pench tiger reserves. Kanha national park have Sal forest in majority of area. Sal tree get dried up on Feb-Mar months and regain greenery with new leaves from mid of March thus don't expect high level of dryness in summers. You can enjoy greenery. Still due to dryness in under-growths, visibility increases.

Birding is something which seems easy than doing tiger or other mammal tracking. Watching different colorful birds of different size with different voice is amazing experience. Birding gives more opportunity to do photography. At Kanha national park, birds photography experience will be very good if we travel from December to June month. Here once again vulture population started increaseing thus we have better chance to do vultures photography at there nesting sites, on meadow areas etc. Similarly recently we have experienced that racket-tailed drongo sighting is also very frequent in summer season. Due to some dryness in forest, visibility increases, offering convenience in photography.

Sometimes more popularity becomes a challenge for tourists who plans late or last moment visitors. Unavailability of safari permits is great challenge now a days. Peak season duration has been increased due to high popularity. Still we can find some gaps when we may expect better chance to get core zone safari permits to enjoy safari drives. From October to December, permits get sold out due to festival dates. Here we should try to visit from one week after Diwali dates till 23rd of December. In this duration we may get core zone permits easily. Similarly January & February months are such when nature is at its best, flame of forest flower trees begins to display flowers, days will be bright sunny thus good chance for photography of sloth bear, tiger, birds.