Bhitarkanika

Bhitarkanika National Park lies in Kendrapara district, in Odisha, on the delta of the Brahmani, Baitarani and Dhamra rivers, on the coast of the Bay of Bengal. It protects India's second largest mangrove ecosystem, after the Sundarbans. The area was the private hunting ground of the royal family of Kanika until it was declared a wildlife sanctuary in 1975 and a national park in 1998; in 2002 it was also listed as a Ramsar site.

Its conservation history is a much-cited success story. The crocodile breeding and rehabilitation programme launched at Dangmal in 1975, with support from the UNDP and the FAO, developed the rear-and-release technique that saved the saltwater crocodile from local extinction: from 96 animals in 1974 the count rose to 1,784 in the census of January 2022. It is today the largest population of the species in India and one of the few in the world where 10% of the adults exceed six metres.

The adjacent coast of Gahirmatha, managed separately as a marine sanctuary, is the largest mass nesting site of the olive ridley turtle on the planet: between February and April the arribada takes place, the simultaneous arrival of hundreds of thousands of females to lay, and from November to May a fishing ban applies that is the subject of permanent negotiation with the coastal communities. The park is also home to the Bagagahana heronry, one of the largest in Asia, and is one of the few places in India where eight kingfisher species live side by side.