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Mahseer and The Elf 'n' Safety Crew

P

Paul Boote

No Longer a Member
I dunno, in my day you could wade that river whilst fishing and thumbing your nose at a waiting man-eating tiger on the bank...

River-Ramganga1-550x412.jpg



http://caughtbytheriver.net/2011/02/postcard-from-chris-watson/
 
Ah, the humour of India...I wonder if the rafting holidays will suffer as a result!

On the two trips I have had to this delightful river, I didn't witness many mugger/crocs and had just one glimpse of a fish eating gharial.

Maybe I need to look harder...& wade more carefully:)
 
They're there all right, Mark, muggers and gharial, particularly around High Bank (the Crocodile Pool, no fishing here even in the 1970s) and in the river's lower reaches just above and in the lake. Foulhooked a big mugger (10 feet, probably) whilst spinning the river mouth and into the lake. Not a bad fight, but broke it off.
 
Yes. The deep pool by Gairal Forest Rest House Bungalow on the upper part of the Ramganga River within Corbett National Park was (became) famous for a TRUE monster, an often river-dwelling, giant King Cobra that would occasionally leave its preferred sub-aquatic spot beneath a small-house-sized submerged rock and swim like the eel in your worst nightmare far down in the clear waters of the pool. Terrifying the first time I saw it, as just two days earlier my girl and I had been swimming just ten yards upriver.
 
Paul Boote said:
Yes. The deep pool by Gairal Forest Rest House Bungalow on the upper part of the Ramganga River within Corbett National Park was (became) famous for a TRUE monster, an often river-dwelling, giant King Cobra that would occasionally leave its preferred sub-aquatic spot beneath a small-house-sized submerged rock and swim like the eel in your worst nightmare far down in the clear waters of the pool. Terrifying the first time I saw it, as just two days earlier my girl and I had been swimming just ten yards upriver.
Click to expand...


PS - There were some big b'stard pythons, too.
 
My first & so far only encounter with a Cobra was whilst walking through the scrub to our chosen pool on the Ramganga, My pal & I walked past a huge King Cobra, must have been 8-10ft. We did not see it or hear it move. However, it saw us, we were alerted to it by the guides walking several yards behind us..

They whistled, we turned about to see this huge snake disappearing into the scrub. It shocked me to see this thing move so fast, I doubt many people could out run it!

Not realising the full scale of what had happened I ask one of the guides what kind of snake it was.

he replied "Is bad snake, Sir, very bad snake!"

"Yes but what kind" I responded.

"King Cobra! Sir"

That night, on the same trail back to camp, in the dark, was a most uncomfortable journey. :)
 
Definitely "not good" critters, King Cobras. The venom from a big one can kill an elephant, or, in real money, according to an article I read earlier, 42 human beings. Elephants - lone bull elephants in breeding "musth" and cows with a calf - are ruddy dangerous animals, too.
 
pythons are not very nice, people don't fear them as much as venomous snakes but I've seen them eat a whole deer head first, imagine that...nice!
 
SNAKES - You might have convinced me to go Mahseer fishing.

I think most snake bites occur early in the morning when their cold and sluggish and find it difficult to leg it away from the plonker who's about to step on it.

Either look where your putting your feet or swish a stick it front of yourself as you walk.

Just don't mess with Taipans; very fast, very aggressive, very agile, very long front of mouth fangs and very poisonous! But you get them in OZ.

Pythons are good for a play though because their slow. The carpet python in OZ has a yellow and black body and a blue inside to its mouth - looks spectacular, I had more than one view when I travelled their!
 
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