Sloth Bear - Wilpattu, Sri Lanka

 

Seeing Sloth Bears in Sri Lanka is relatively rare. I hadn't had a clear sighting for ages but that changed on my last trip to Wilpattu. We came across this bear while we were on a quiet morning drive. Fortunately there were only a handful of vehicles in the park and we were able to observe the bear without being disturbed.  We stopped the car and watched the bear walking down the road towards us. It walked about a 100 meters in our direction before it moved into the undergrowth and disappeared. 

Leopards - Wilpattu, Sri Lanka

 

Wilpattu was quiet last week with all the Covid-19 scares and fortunately, we were in the park. I'd have seen about 4 different vehicles within the park on our different drives. It was avery different experience from Yala with drivers cooperating with each other and actually tracking animals instead of being on the phone. We came across this pair of mating leopards on one of our morning drives and were able to watch them for about 15 minutes before they moved deeper into the jungle. This photograph was taken during one of their interactions.