Qualla: Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary

Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary: Introduction

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit PJeganathan, CC BY-SA 4.0. Every October, the sky above Point Calimere fills with wings. Greater flamingos arrive from the Rann of Kutch, painted storks from across South Asia, and shorebirds from as far as Siberia and northern Russia -- more than 100,000 individuals representing 103 species, all converging on a narrow spit of land where Tamil Nadu pushes into the sea. Created in 1967 to protect the blackbuck, this sanctuary at the southeastern tip of Nagapattinam District has become something far larger: an internationally recognized Ramsar wetland, an Important Bird Area, and one of the subcontinent's premier stages for the ancient drama of migration.

Image: PJeganathan | CC BY-SA 4.0

Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary: Where Two Seas Collide

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit PJeganathan, CC BY-SA 4.0. Point Calimere occupies a peculiar geography. The sanctuary is effectively an island -- the Bay of Bengal to the east, the Palk Strait to the south, and swampy backwaters and commercial salt pans enclosing it from the west and north. Low sand dunes line the coast, stabilized in t...

Image: PJeganathan | CC BY-SA 4.0

Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary: The Great Arrival

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Marcus334, CC BY-SA 3.0. The birds begin appearing in October. They come from the Rann of Kutch in Gujarat, from the steppes of Central Asia, from Eastern Siberia and northern Russia, and from parts of Europe. By peak season, the sanctuary hosts the second-largest congregation of migratory waterbirds in ...

Image: Marcus334 | CC BY-SA 3.0

Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary: Beyond the Birds

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Rajesh mpt, CC BY-SA 4.0. Point Calimere is not only a bird sanctuary. Blackbuck, the elegant spiral-horned antelope for which the reserve was originally established, graze the grasslands alongside chital deer. Golden jackals hunt at the forest margins. Bonnet macaques swing through the canopy of Manilkar...

Image: Rajesh mpt | CC BY-SA 4.0

Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary: Chola Light and Sacred Ground

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Marcus334, CC BY-SA 3.0. Near the point itself stand the remains of a brick-and-mortar lighthouse said to have been built by the Chola dynasty more than a thousand years ago. The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami badly damaged the structure, but its ruins still emerge in the intertidal zone near a newer British-...

Image: Marcus334 | CC BY-SA 3.0

Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary: Holding the Line

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Marcus334, CC BY-SA 3.0. Conservation at Point Calimere is an ongoing negotiation with scarcity. Fresh water has always been the limiting factor. In 1979, the first water troughs were filled from barrels transported by bullock cart. Today, bore wells and an elevated tank on the sanctuary's western edge s...

Image: Marcus334 | CC BY-SA 3.0