Kumana Wildlife: What You Will Actually See

Chital (Spotted Deer) Common

Axis axis

The prey base the whole leopard story rests on, and the animal whose alarm call tells you where the cat is.

Where: Lagoon margins and open forest. Best: Year round.

Tufted Grey Langur Common Near Threatened

Semnopithecus priam

Long-limbed, silver-grey and black-faced, sitting in the open on a ruin or a track edge in every dry zone park.

Where: Tall trees around the villu and along the entrance track. Best: Year round.

Golden Jackal Regular

Canis aureus

The dry zone's opportunist, trotting along a track at dawn and howling in chorus at dusk so the whole park knows where it is.

Where: Track margins and the open ground beside the lagoons at either end of the day. Best: Year round.

Toque Macaque Regular Endangered

Macaca sinica

A small endemic monkey with a swirl of hair on the crown arranged like a cap, and the most studied primate on the island.

Where: Woodland edge and around the bungalows. Best: Year round.

Wild Water Buffalo Regular Endangered

Bubalus arnee

Wide-swept horns spanning further than any other bovid, on an animal that is genuinely dangerous and genuinely rare in its true wild form.

Where: Wallowing in the villu and the lagoon shallows through the heat. Best: Year round.

Asian Elephant Occasional Endangered

Elephas maximus

The largest land animal in Asia, and a genuinely wild one is worth seeking out over the camp elephants most tourists meet.

Where: Scrub and lagoon margins. Best: May to September.

Ruddy Mongoose Occasional

Urva smithii

A big reddish mongoose that carries its black-tipped tail curled up over its back as it crosses a track.

Where: Crossing tracks and working the scrub edge. Best: Year round.

Sri Lankan Leopard Occasional Endangered

Panthera pardus kotiya

The largest leopard subspecies in the world, and on this island it is the top predator, which changes how it behaves.

Where: Forest edge and lagoon margins. Best: Apr-Jul. Yala's eastern neighbour, quieter, same population.

Sloth Bear Rare Vulnerable

Melursus ursinus

A shaggy, long-clawed insect specialist that vacuums termites out of a mound loudly enough to hear from fifty metres.

Where: Dry scrub and fruiting trees away from the lagoons. Best: June to July when fruit is on.

Indian Peafowl Common

Pavo cristatus

Wild, and behaving like a wild bird: displaying on a termite mound at dawn with leopards in the same scrub.

Where: Open scrub, lagoon margins and the villu edges. Best: Year round.

Spot-billed Pelican Common Near Threatened

Pelecanus philippensis

A pelican that fishes the ancient irrigation tanks, and one of the few large waterbirds doing better now than it was.

Where: The Kumana villu, where the colony nests in the flooded mangrove. Best: April to July. The villu is a breeding colony site, which is what the park is actually protected for. Pelicans, storks, herons and cormorants nest over the water together.

Black-headed Ibis Regular Near Threatened

Threskiornis melanocephalus

White body, bare black head and neck, and a bill built for finding what it cannot see.

Where: The villu and the mangrove edges. Best: Year round.

Bronze-winged Jacana Regular

Metopidius indicus

Toes so long it walks across floating leaves, and a breeding system in which the female holds the territory and the males do all the work.

Where: The villu and lily covered shallows. Best: Year round.

Grey-headed Fish Eagle Regular Near Threatened

Icthyophaga ichthyaetus

Sits low over the water on a dead branch for hours, then drops feet first and comes up with a fish half its own weight.

Where: Dead branches over the villu and the lagoon. Best: Year round.

Pied Kingfisher Regular

Ceryle rudis

The largest bird in the world that can hover in still air with no wind to help it, which is how it fishes open water no perch reaches.

Where: Hovering over the lagoon channels and the villu shallows. Best: Year round.

Sri Lanka Junglefowl Regular

Gallus lafayettii

The national bird, and the wild ancestor's cousin: a jungle cockerel with a yellow-centred red comb found nowhere else on earth.

Where: Scrub edges and track sides in the dry forest. Best: Year round, easiest at first light.

Brown Fish Owl Occasional

Ketupa zeylonensis

A big owl with bare unfeathered legs, because feathers are a liability when you fish with your feet.

Where: Large trees at the villu edge, at dusk. Best: Year round.

Cotton Pygmy Goose Occasional

Nettapus coromandelianus

One of the smallest waterfowl on earth, nesting in tree holes and sitting out on lily pads.

Where: The lily covered villu. Best: Year round.

Eurasian Spoonbill Occasional

Platalea leucorodia

Feeds by sweeping that absurd bill side to side through the shallows, snapping shut the instant it touches something alive.

Where: The villu shallows. Best: Nov-Mar.

Malabar Pied Hornbill Occasional Near Threatened

Anthracoceros coronatus

The island's big hornbill, sealing the female into a tree hollow behind a wall of mud for the whole nesting period.

Where: Forest along the Kumbukkan Oya. Best: Year round.

Yellow Bittern Occasional

Ixobrychus sinensis

Freezes with its bill pointed straight up and vanishes into the reeds, which is why almost nobody sees it despite it being everywhere.

Where: Reedbeds around the villu. Best: Year round.

Great Thick-knee Rare Near Threatened

Esacus recurvirostris

A heavy, huge-eyed shorebird that stands motionless on open shingle all day and only comes alive at dusk.

Where: Dry lagoon margins and open sand. Best: Year round.

Greater Flamingo Rare

Phoenicopterus roseus

Several thousand birds on the Bundala salt pans in a good winter, filtering brine shrimp upside down.

Where: Lagoon shallows. Best: Dec-Feb.

Pallid Harrier Rare Near Threatened

Circus macrourus

Quarters the grassland at head height on raised wings, tilting and rocking, hunting entirely by sound and surprise.

Where: Grassland and lagoon margins. Best: Nov-Mar.

Sirkeer Malkoha Rare

Taccocua leschenaultii

A cuckoo that gave up on being a cuckoo: it builds its own nest, raises its own young and runs along the ground rather than flying.

Where: Low thorn scrub away from the water. Best: Year round.

Asian Water Monitor Common

Varanus salvator

A dragon sized lizard that swims canals and city parks, second only to the Komodo dragon in length.

Where: Villu margins, lagoon edges and the track verges. Best: Year round.

Checkered Keelback Common

Fowlea piscator

The snake you will actually see in Sri Lanka, hunting fish in a paddy channel in broad daylight.

Where: Villu shallows and the lagoon channels. Best: Year round.

Mugger Crocodile Common Vulnerable

Crocodylus palustris

The broadest snout of any living crocodile, and in one Sri Lankan park block there are more of them per square kilometre than anywhere else on earth.

Where: The Kumana villu and the lagoon channels, hauled out on the banks. Best: Year round.

Oriental Garden Lizard Common

Calotes versicolor

The everyday garden lizard whose breeding males flush blood red about the head, earning the name bloodsucker.

Where: Scrub and track verges throughout. Best: Year round.

Sri Lankan Common Skink Common

Eutropis lankae

The bronze skink basking on every wall, ruin and hotel lawn in the country turned out in 2020 to be an endemic species, not the Indian one everybody had been calling it.

Where: Sandy ground, track verges and the bungalow surrounds. Best: Year round.

Bengal Monitor Regular

Varanus bengalensis

A dry-country monitor that climbs well, digs constantly and eats essentially anything smaller than itself.

Where: Dry scrub and open ground away from the water. Best: Year round.

Indian Black Turtle Regular Near Threatened

Melanochelys trijuga

The dark, three keeled turtle basking on every half sunk log in the dry zone, and the northern race is found nowhere else on earth.

Where: Basking on logs and floating weed at the villu margins. Best: Year round.

Indian Cobra Occasional

Naja naja

The spectacled cobra of South Asian myth, and one of the very few snakes a visitor to the dry zone parks has a real chance of seeing.

Where: Crossing tracks and around the scrub margins. Best: Year round.

Indian Rock Python Occasional Near Threatened

Python molurus

Sri Lanka's largest snake, and in the dry season it lies out at the edge of a shrinking waterhole where every animal in the park has to come.

Where: Villu margins and mangrove roots, sometimes swimming. Best: Year round.

Indian Star Tortoise Occasional Vulnerable

Geochelone elegans

The most trafficked tortoise on earth, and the Sri Lankan animals are the biggest and the most boldly starred of the lot.

Where: Open scrub and dune country behind the lagoons. Best: After rain.

Olive Ridley Turtle Occasional Vulnerable

Lepidochelys olivacea

The smallest and most numerous sea turtle, famous elsewhere for mass nestings of thousands at once.

Where: The park beaches between Okanda and Kumana, coming ashore at night. Best: October to March. The east coast nesting beaches are quieter and far less watched than the south coast ones.

Painted-lip Lizard Occasional

Calotes ceylonensis

A dry zone endemic with a red stripe painted along its upper lip, and when it is alarmed the stripe flashes white.

Where: Forest edge and riverine woodland. Best: Year round.

Russell's Viper Occasional

Daboia russelii

The snake that kills more people in Sri Lanka than any other, sitting in plain sight on a paddy bund and hissing like a punctured tyre.

Where: Open ground and warm track surfaces at dusk. Best: Year round.

Sri Lankan Flapshell Turtle Occasional Vulnerable

Lissemys ceylonensis

The only chelonian species found solely in Sri Lanka, split off from its mainland cousin eight million years ago, and still without a conservation status of its own.

Where: Muddy shallows of the villu and the feeder channels. Best: Year round.

Asian Common Toad Common

Duttaphrynus melanostictus

The ubiquitous warty toad of doorsteps and gardens, hoovering up insects under every night light.

Where: Bungalow surrounds and track verges after dark. Best: Year round.

Skittering Frog Common

Euphlyctis cyanophlyctis

Disturbed, it does not dive. It skips across the surface like a flat stone, and it can launch from open water with nothing to push against.

Where: Villu shallows, ditches and the lagoon margins. Best: Year round.

Jerdon's Bullfrog Occasional

Hoplobatrachus crassus

The biggest frog on the island, and its tadpoles hunt and eat other tadpoles, including each other when the pool gets crowded.

Where: Rain pools and seasonally flooded grassland. Best: October to January.

Crimson Rose Common Near Threatened

Pachliopta hector

Flies slowly and in the open because it is poisonous and every predator on the island knows it.

Where: Flowering scrub along the tracks. Best: Year round.

Golden Orb-weaver Common

Nephila pilipes

A giant black-and-yellow spider spinning webs of golden silk strong enough to snare small birds.

Where: Webs slung between scrub along the tracks. Best: Year round.

Signature Spider Common

Argiope anasuja

Writes a bold zigzag across the middle of its own web, and nobody is entirely sure why.

Where: Scrub and track-edge vegetation. Best: Year round.

Giant Forest Scorpion Occasional

Heterometrus swammerdami

Among the largest scorpions on earth, and its sting is milder than a bee's.

Where: Under logs and around the bungalows after dark. Best: Year round.