Nagarhole National Park (Rajiv Gandhi National Park)

Nagarhole National  Park is one among India's best wildlife parks, established in 1955 as a sanctuary and designated as a National park in 1975. Recently it was renamed as Rajiv Gandhi National Park after the late Prime Minister of India.

The park is located at Kodagu (Coorg) in Mysore district in the state of Karnataka. The vast area  of the park, 572.90 sq km is united with Arikeri, Hatgat, Nalkeri, Mysore reserve forests, streams, waterfalls, Hills and valleys etc .

Nagarhole is part of the 2400 sq km of forest which includes the Bandipur National Park in Karnataka, Mudhumalai Wildlife Sanctuary in Tamil Nadu, Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary in Kerala which together constitute the Niligiri Biosphere Reserve. This is the largest forest cover of its kind in South East Asia. The altitude of Nagarhole Park varies between 700-850 meters. The maximum temperature reaches 33 degrees C and the minimum is 14 degrees.

The Park mainly consists of moist deciduous forest in the northern and western parts and dry deciduous forest in the south-eastern part. Plantations of teak, Rosewood, bamboo, sandal, silver oak trees and species of eucalyptus cover most of the area of the park.