Tal Chapper Sanctuary

Tal Chapper is accessible from both Bikaner and Jaipur. The sanctuary is in Sujangarh in Churu. It lies on Nokha- Sujangarh state highway, at a distance of 85 km from Churu & 132 Km from Bikaner. The Jaipur airport is nearly 200 km away.

It is a small sanctuary that earlier used to be the private hunting reserve of the Maharaja of Bikaner. He introduced the Black Buck to this reserve and now it is also known as Black Buck Park. Black bucks are the most elegant antelopes found in India and are also revered as a sacred animal by the Bishnoi community.

The sanctuary is situated in flat tract land that is interspersed with shallow low lying areas. There are small hillocks and exposed rocks of slate and quartzite in parts of the sanctuary. Earlier the Tal Chapper sanctuary used to become flooded by water during the heavy rains and had salt mining going on in the watershed.

A large number of migratory birds come here in the month of September. Sparrow hawk, Ben harrier, Montague's harrier, imperial eagle, marsh harrier, pale harrier, tawny eagle, skylark, short toed eagle, sparrow hawk, ring drove, crested lark, brown dove, blue jay, black ibis, green bee eaters, demoiselle cranes, blue jays and cranes can all easily be spotted by birdwatchers.

The sanctuary has grasslands scattered with Acacia and Prosopis trees that give it the appearance of the Savannas. Mothiya is a special type of grass found here. Its uniqueness is that it has seeds that are pearl (Moti) shaped. Black Bucks and certain birds feed on this grass and its seeds.

The Tal Chapper sanctuary can be visited from September to March.