Top 7 Species of Fauna in Western Ghats of India

The Western Ghats lies with the Sahyadri mountains ranges along the western side of India and separates the Deccan plateau from a narrow coastal plain of the Arabian Sea. The beautiful green valley is home to thousands of wild animal species including at least 325 globally threatened species.

The national parks and  hill ranges of Western Ghats serve as an important wildlife corridors to big Indian cats, Great Indian elephants, wild boars, vulnerable Gaur – Recently Western Ghat is announced as one of the UNESCO world heritage site in India.

Mammals

The great Western Ghats are home to thousands of rare and magnificent mammals including The big cats of India black panther, Leopard and the Royal Bengal Tiger. The endangered mammal of the Western ghats are lion-tailed macaque and malabar large-spotted civet.

The Nilgiri bio-sphere is home to the largest population of Asian elephants and forms an important project elephant and project tiger reserve. Two of the rare animal of western ghat is nilgiri marten and nilgiri tahr.

Birds ! Malabar ! Nilgiri

The world’s most biodiversity hotspot is home to 508 species of bird,which are also found in the Nilgiri biosphere reserve. The western ghats endemic birds are the most beautiful Malabar parakeet, nilgiri wood-pigeon, malabar grey horn bill, grey-headed bulbul, nilgiri flycatcher and other giant flying predators.

Bhadra wildlife sanctuary is the best place to spot the colorful species of birds around the Western Ghat.

Reptiles

The Western ghats has an impressive diversity of reptiles including one of the most dangerous snake of Western ghats, a Viper. There are 13 species of lizards found in Western ghats, few of them are monitor lizard,dwarf gecko and the malabar flying lizard. The great Western ghats is also home for the largest venomous snake of world and biggest venomous snake in India, king cobra.

The giant king cobra inhabits and pray into the endangered rain forests of the Western ghats to the dense forest of Kerala.

Amphibians – Frog ! Toad

The amphibians of the Western ghats is specially rich in its amphibian diversity. There are more than 80% of the 179 amphibian species being endemic to the region, including endangered purple frog and Malabar flying frog.

The endangered purple frog also known as pig nose frog is a living fossil. The rainforests of these mountains are home for diverse and unique species of frogs, four new species of anurans have been described recently from the Western Ghats.

Fish –

The exotic water bodies of western ghats listed around 218 species of primary and secondary freshwater fishes.

The global biodiversity hotspots is home to several brilliantly colored ornamental fishes, like barb, puffer fish and catfish. Three major rivers of Western Ghats the Godavari, Krishna, and Holy Kaveri, numerous waterfalls and magnificent lakes are home for many species of fishes.

Insects

The global hot spot of Western ghats is also well known for its insects, 334 species of butterfly, 43 species of bugs and many more unknown insects.

Western ghats is one of the global biodiversity hotspots which have the wonderful world of insects. There are around 6000 insect species found in the Western ghats and Nilgiri biosphere reserve area.

Molluscs

The non-marine molluscs fauna of India are the part of molluscan family. There are 5070 species of marine and non-marine molluscs living in the wild India,with species of gastropods and bivalves.

The fauna of western ghats includes 139 mammal species, reptiles, the amphibians- endangered purple frog, 102 species of fish, molluscs, annelids, 508 bird species with Malabar name tag.