Anawilundawa Bird Santuary - Puttalam - Sri Lanka.

Anawilundawa is one of the most beautiful places with abundance of natural beauty in the island of Sri Lanka. It is one of the few wetland sanctuaries in the central west coast, located near Puttalam. Puttalam is an important region in the coconut triangle and it is a leading contributor for the Sri Lanka’s coconut industry. Even though Anawilundawa is recognized as an impotent natural habitat it is not known to most of the people in the island. Hence very few people enjoy the remarkable scenery and wild life of it. Anawilundawa wetland covers more than 1,397 hectares of land. First it was declared as a protected sanctuary in 1997 and it was offered the status of wetland of national Importance under the Ramsar Convention in 2001. There is very little publication written with the information of this beautiful wet land. Anawilundawa is an extremely valuable place for the nature lovers and it can be used to promote nature tourism in the country. It is not only rich in natural beauty but also the historical importance.

History of Anawilundawa is going back to 1.140 AD. This wetland is fed by an ancient irrigation tank that was built more than thousand years ago. The builder of the irrigation network was the King Parakramabahu the great, the monarch famed for his irrigation schemes. There are seven tanks that are in varying sizes between 12-50 hectares can be found in the area and Anawilundawa take the center point. Tanks are interconnected through the Deduru oya and Rathambala oya that take water from higher elevated tanks to the lower elevated tanks. Ultimately the excess water leads to the Dutch Canal which is located towards the west of the wet land.

Ecosystems

There are three ecosystems are identified in the Anawilundawa wetland complex namely freshwater wetland system (tanks, canals, marsh, reed, beds and seasonally flooded grasslands), brackish water wetland system (mangroves, salt marshland, brackish water gardens), and terrestrial and agriculture systems (tank bund vegetation, agricultural lands, home gardens, beaches, sand dunes). Anawilundawa shows high bio diversity with large number of fauna species such as birds, mammals, reptiles, fish and butterflies. The wetland is inhabited by number of endemic fauna species and large number of flora species as well. According to the naturalists there are 264 species of plants in the protected area. The forest serves the villagers in the area by providing valuable medicinal plants such as Pubulu (used for fractures and eczema). The number of aquatic plants found in the reserve is 22, lilies and lotus flower are dominating the tanks.

Birding

Anawilundawa is one of the best places for bird watching in Sri Lanka. Wetland habitat in Anawilundawa provided one of the best living habitats for birds. One can see large number of migrant birds as well as native bird species. The recorded number of vertebrates in Anawilundawa is 237 and 39% of it considered being native to the island.

Anawilundawa is inhabited by large number of fresh water as well as brackish water fish species. About half of the fish species in the island can be observed here while four species are endemic to the island. Large number of reptiles and amphibian species also can be observed here. Anawilundawa is inhabited by some of the endemic amphibians such as Sri Lanka wood frog (Rana gracilis).