"Homrai" - The Great Hornbill

Kaziranga National Park

“Fhump ! Fhump ! Fhump !” It came from behind us, the sound. It wasn’t hurried at all and there was like a 2 second pause between the “Fhump s”. I didn’t realize what was going on and as it started again, Tamuli, our driver went like, “Hornbill ! Hornbill ! as he slammed the brakes and started looking around frantically in our open gypsy. My brain was still processing all this info when, in between that loud, wing flapping sound, he crossed us overhead. He was using the open width of the forest road to stay below the tree line. Tamuli, was getting into gear and I was getting my lens cap off when my brain finally settled on the fact that a Great Hornbill had just flown only a few feet above my head and was now gliding right in front of me, parallel to the road. I wish I had a picture of that sight. I don’t, things were too frantic. I remember being in awe of how this huge bird was taking up the whole road. I had finally met, the “Homrai” - King of the jungle (in Nepali).

It’s not like I hadn’t seen Horbills before, Im from Assam, we see them flying around the forest but never one up close. It’s not common. You usually see them going places high up in the sky. Our guy was foraging and it became apparent that the road was part of his strategy. He would move from tree to tree along the road so as not to hit any branches while he flew low looking for munchies.

So that’s what we did, well, he did and we tailed for like 3 branches. He got wise after like 2 times and looked back at us. He hit one more spot then and was gone, flew up and that was that.

Start to finish, the sighting was like 5 minutes long. Yeah, I just checked the photo data. But for me, it was a very, very special 5 minutes. Happy in your chest and belly all day after those 5 minutes. I remember telling my gf (wife now), “that’s the sighting of the day”. It was the sighting of the trip. After all, it’s not every day that you get to have the king to yourself even if it is for 5 minutes.