BARAIL Wildlife Sanctuary is located in the southern part of ''

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

'', in

Cachar Cachar district is an administrative district in the state of Assam in India. After independence the undivided Cachar district was split into four districts in Assam: Dima Hasao district (formerly North Cachar Hills), Cachar district alongside ...

district and lies between 24°55΄53΄΄-25°05΄52΄΄ N latitude and 92°27΄40΄΄-93°04΄30΄΄ E longitude. The Dima Hasao part of Barail is not part of this sanctuary. The altitude ranges between 55–1500 m above mean sea level. It spreads over 326.24 km². The annual average rainfall and temperature range from 2500–4000 mm and 9.2 °C to 36.2 °C respectively; the Humidity varies from 62% to 83%. Field works in Barail area proposed as a national park/sanctuary in 1980s. The sanctuary consists of the North Cachar Reserved Forest and Barail Reserved Forest, located within Cachar district. The habitat has been classified as moist tropical evergreen and semi-evergreen forests. The forest is home to a wide diversity of wildlife. Mammals found in Barail Sanctuary includes slow loris, hoolock gibbon, capped langur, Assamese macaque, pig-tailed macaque,

stump-tailed macaque The stump-tailed macaque (''Macaca arctoides''), also called the bear macaque, is a species of macaque native to South Asia and Southeast Asia. In India, it occurs south of the Brahmaputra River, in the northeastern part of the country. Its range ...

rhesus monkey The rhesus macaque (''Macaca mulatta''), colloquially rhesus monkey, is a species of Old World monkey. There are between six and nine recognised subspecies that are split between two groups, the Chinese-derived and the Indian-derived. Generally b ...

, Himalayan black bear,

Malayan sun bear The sun bear (''Helarctos malayanus'') is a species in the Family (biology), family Ursidae (the only species in the genus ''Helarctos'') occurring in the tropical forests of Southeast Asia. It is the smallest bear, standing nearly at the sho ...

leopard cat The leopard cat (''Prionailurus bengalensis'') is a small wild cat native to continental South, Southeast, and East Asia. Since 2002 it has been listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List as it is widely distributed although threatened by hab ...

, jungle cat, golden cat,

clouded leopard The clouded leopard (''Neofelis nebulosa''), also called the mainland clouded leopard, is a wild cat inhabiting dense forests from the foothills of the Himalayas through mainland Southeast Asia into South China. In the early 19th century, a cl ...

, barking deer,

red serow The red serow (''Capricornis rubidus''), also called the Burmese red serow is a goat-antelope thought to be native to southern Bangladesh and northern Myanmar. It has been sometimes been considered a subspecies of '' C. sumatraensis''. In the nor ...

and

wild pig A wild pig may be: *Suina, a suborder of even-toed mammals, including: **Suidae, a family of animals that are pigs or pig-like, including the Suinae and more distantly related extinct Old World tribes ***Suinae, a subfamily which includes the ''S ...

. With more than 300 species of birds the sanctuary is a birdwatchers paradise. Some noteworthy species found includes White-backed vulture,

Slender-billed vulture The slender-billed vulture (''Gyps tenuirostris'') is an Old World vulture species native to sub-Himalayan regions and Southeast Asia. It is Critically Endangered since 2002 as the population on the Indian subcontinent has declined rapidly. As ...

, Rufous-throated and White-cheeked hill partridges, Grey peacock pheasant, Kaleej pheasant,

Great pied hornbill The great hornbill (''Buceros bicornis''), also known as the concave-casqued hornbill, great Indian hornbill or great pied hornbill, is one of the larger members of the hornbill family. It occurs in the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. It ...

, Oriental pied hornbill,

Rufous-necked hornbill The rufous-necked hornbill (''Aceros nipalensis'') is a species of hornbill in Bhutan, northeastern India, especially in Arunachal Pradesh, Indian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia. It is locally extinct in Nepal due to hunting and significant loss ...

, Wreathed hornbill, and

Austen's brown hornbill Austen's brown hornbill (''Anorrhinus austeni'') is a species of hornbill found in forests from northeastern India and south to Vietnam and northern Thailand. It is sometimes included as a subspecies of Tickell's brown hornbill. Description I ...

.Choudhury, A.U. (2000). ''The birds of Assam''. Gibbon Books & WWF-India. Pp. 240. Reptiles include Burmese rock python and king cobra. Besides above, the sanctuary also harbors a high diversity of floral wealth, e.g., ''

Ornithochilus cacharensis ''Phalaenopsis cacharensis'' is a rare orchid native to Cachar, Assam which has only one plant ever recorded. The single plant was discovered by Hussain Ahmed Barbhuiya of the Botanical Survey of India while doing field work in the Borail Wild ...

,'' an epiphytic orchid species, '' Larsenianthus assamensis'' a terrestrial zingiber species,
Diospyros cacharensis
'' a small deciduous tree belonging to family

Ebenaceae The Ebenaceae are a family of flowering plants belonging to order Ericales. The family includes ebony and persimmon among about 768 species of trees and shrubs. It is distributed across the tropical and warmer temperate regions of the world. It ...

, and
Alseodaphne keenanii
' a large tree belonging to family

Lauraceae Lauraceae, or the laurels, is a plant family that includes the true laurel and its closest relatives. This family comprises about 2850 known species in about 45 genera worldwide (Christenhusz & Byng 2016 ). They are dicotyledons, and occur ma ...

were described for the first time for this sanctuary, and all are

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

north-east India , native_name_lang = mni , settlement_type = , image_skyline = , image_alt = , image_caption = , motto = , image_map = Northeast india.png , ...

. The nearest town is Silchar, which is 40 km away. The sanctuary is also a good destination for trekkers.

References

{{coord missing, Assam Wildlife sanctuaries in Assam Cachar district Dima Hasao district Protected areas with year of establishment missing