Haors, forests and wildlife of the Sylhet division

How the haors fill and drain, where the gibbons and waterbirds live, what threatens them, and how to watch wildlife here without doing harm.

Few parts of Bangladesh change shape as completely as the Sylhet division. In January you can walk across a dry haor between rice fields and shrinking beels; by July the same ground lies under several metres of water, and the villages stand on their raised mounds like islands. Around this basin rise low hills of tea and the last sizeable stretches of hill forest in the north-east, where western hoolock gibbons call across the canopy in the morning.

The lie of the land

The division fills the north-east corner of Bangladesh, a low basin with hills in India on three sides: the Khasi and Jaintia hills of Meghalaya to the north, the hills of Assam to the east and those of Tripura to the south. Rain on those slopes drains straight into the basin, and that water, more than anything, shapes the land.

The main artery is the Barak, which rises in the Manipur hills and splits as it enters Bangladesh. The northern arm, the Surma, flows past Sylhet and Sunamganj, fed by streams from Meghalaya; the southern arm, the Kushiyara, takes in rivers such as the Manu from Tripura. They rejoin above Bhairab Bazar as the Meghna.

Between and around these rivers spreads a floodplain of haors, beels and old channels; Banglapedia notes that haors cover all of Sunamganj, much of Habiganj and parts of Sylhet and Moulvibazar. The higher ground is a belt of low red hillocks, the tila, which carry most of the tea gardens and surviving forests. In the north, rivers leave the hills over beds of stone at places such as Jaflong and Bholaganj, which is why stone extraction is such a problem there.

What a haor is, and how the water moves

A haor is a wide, bowl-shaped depression in the floodplain that collects water from rivers and canals. The word is usually traced to the Sanskrit sagar, sea, as it is pronounced in Sylhet and northern Mymensingh. Banglapedia counts about 47 major haors in the region and some 6,300 beels, the deeper pools inside them, of which about 3,500 hold water all year.

The year runs in four phases, and when you go decides which haor you see:

• December to March: the water drains to scattered beels, farmers plant boro rice on the silt and fishing peaks. The wintering ducks are here.
• April and May: the boro harvest races the first floods, and untimely flash floods from rain in the hills upstream can drown the rice before it is cut.
• June to September: the beels merge into one sheet of water up to about 6 m deep, villages become islands, and from July strong winds raise waves that can damage homesteads.
• October and November: the water falls, mudflats reappear and the first migratory birds arrive.

Hakaluki Haor has about 4,400 hectares of open water in the dry season and more than 18,000 in flood, and parts of the basin stay under water for seven or eight months.

Homesteads cluster on the slightly higher rims and on raised mounds, which the Ramsar listing for Tanguar describes as almost the only dry land in the monsoon. Fish is the main harvest after rice. Swamp forest of hijal and koroch, trees that can stand in water for months, once lined most haors; Banglapedia describes it as reduced to a few small patches.

Tanguar Haor

Tanguar Haor, in Tahirpur and Madhyanagar upazilas of Sunamganj, is one of the most important wetlands in Bangladesh. It was declared an Ecologically Critical Area in 1999, and on 10 July 2000 it became the country's second Ramsar site after the Sundarbans. Ramsar gives its area as 9,500 hectares; Bangladeshi reports give up to about 12,650, depending on the boundary used.

By recent counts it is a network of 54 linked beels, fringed with hijal and koroch at the foot of the Meghalaya hills, and one of the country's main breeding grounds for freshwater fish.

Birds and fish

Ramsar records at least 208 bird species here, 98 of them migratory, and at least 135 fish species; the listing also names Pallas's fish eagle, an endangered raptor, as breeding on the haor. Winter numbers swing widely: a study of six beels counted between about 29,000 and 167,000 waterbirds a year from 2008 to 2021, and Bangladesh Bird Club counts fell from about 60,000 in 2018 to just over 27,000 in 2022.

More than half the species whose trends could be measured were declining. Baer's pochard, a critically endangered diving duck, is reported to have fallen by about 99 percent in Bangladesh since the 1990s.

People of the haor

About 60,000 people live in 88 villages in and around Tanguar, and most make their living from it. For some 70 years its fisheries were leased to contractors under the ijara system, which often shut local fishers out; leasing ended after 1999, and management later passed to the district administration. A long IUCN community programme costing about Tk 33 crore largely missed its aims, according to Prothom Alo, and a new five-year project funded by the Global Environment Facility began in May 2025.

Visiting under the 2025 and 2026 rules

Tourism has grown fast, and so has the damage. By 2025, by local estimates, about 200 houseboats worked the haor each monsoon, with generators, loud music, night lights and waste dumped into water that villagers bathe in. The Sunamganj district administration issued a 12-point visitor code on 21 June 2025, and a Tanguar Haor and Hakaluki Haor Protection Order followed on 6 November 2025.

On 2 August 2026 the district barred all houseboats and tourist boats from the haor's Ecologically Critical Area until further notice. A Prothom Alo report said boats carrying tourists could still travel through Matian Haor and along the Baulai river to Tekerghat. The district also issued a 13-point directive:

• Every houseboat and tourist boat must be registered with the district administration.
• No loud music, microphones or parties on board.
• No single-use plastic and nothing thrown into the water; houseboats need two bins, a water filter and a septic tank.
• Houseboats may be no longer than 100 feet (about 30 m).
• Life jackets, lifebuoys and fire extinguishers on board, and safe use of gas cylinders.
• The visitor code and emergency numbers on display, and the code explained before each trip.
• No trips in storms, heavy rain or lightning.

The rules here have changed several times since 2025. Before paying a deposit, ask to see the operator's registration and permitted route, and check the latest district notice. See the houseboat guide.

Hakaluki, Hail Haor and Baikka Beel

Hakaluki Haor

Hakaluki, the largest haor in Bangladesh, covers about 181 square km of Barlekha, Juri and Kulaura upazilas in Moulvibazar and Golapganj and Fenchuganj in Sylhet. Its more than 238 beels are fed by rivers such as the Juri and Sonai-Bardal. About 200,000 people live around it, and it became an Ecologically Critical Area in 1999.

It is above all a winter place: Banglapedia lists more than 400 bird species, and migratory waterfowl are the main draw from December to February, with otters, freshwater turtles and capped langurs nearby. Distances are long, so hire a boatman who knows where the birds are that season.

Hail Haor and Baikka Beel

Hail Haor is the broad wetland beside Sreemangal, and Baikka Beel, within it, shows what protection can do. On 1 July 2003 the Ministry of Land made its three leased water bodies, about 100 hectares, a permanent sanctuary, giving up the lease income. A community body, the Baragangina Resource Management Organisation, has guarded it since, and no fishing, hunting or gathering of water plants is allowed there.

The USAID-backed MACH project helped deepen parts of the beel, replant swamp trees and build an observation tower, described in 2007 as the first in any Bangladeshi wetland, and by its figures fish catches in the rest of Hail Haor more than doubled. By 2007 the sanctuary had 103 recorded bird species, including Pallas's fish eagle and the greater spotted eagle.

The sanctuary is now under strain. A 2026 report found that silt had swallowed nearly a third of the wetland, that fish were stolen at night, sometimes by armed groups, and that only four guards were on duty. In February 2025 the authorities officially closed the sanctuary to the public and banned picnics, although locals say the order is poorly enforced. Check whether visitors are allowed before you go, and if they are, keep to the path and tower.

Tanguar HaorA Ramsar wetland below the Meghalaya hills, with swamp trees, island villages and winter waterbirds.Hakaluki HaorThe largest haor in Bangladesh by Banglapedia’s account, an inland sea in the rains and a bird refuge in winter.Baikka BeelA protected sanctuary in Hail Haor where winter waterbirds gather, officially closed to visitors since February 2025.

The hill forests

The division's forests are mixed semi-evergreen woods on low hills, broken by tea gardens, villages, roads and the railway. None is large and most have been logged or replanted, yet together they shelter gibbons, langurs, lorises and hundreds of bird species.

Lawachara National Park

Lawachara, about 8 km from Sreemangal in Kamalganj upazila, is the best known: 1,250 hectares of the West Bhanugach Reserved Forest, first reserved in 1917 and a national park since 7 July 1996. Much of it regrew on land cleared and replanted from the 1920s, yet about 246 bird species, more than 160 butterflies, 29 reptiles and 20 to 26 mammals have been recorded.

Its fame rests on the western hoolock gibbon, a tailless ape that lives in small family groups, sings loudly in the morning and is listed as endangered worldwide and critically endangered in Bangladesh. A 2007 census found 62 in 17 groups; a survey reported in 2025 counted 48 in 13 families. Guides say calling often starts between 9 and 10 am, so be on the trail by then. Capped langurs and Phayre's leaf monkeys share the canopy, and the Bengal slow loris comes out at night.

The railway east of Sreemangal runs straight through the forest, as do a road and power lines. By accounts in The Daily Star, scenes of the 1956 Hollywood film Around the World in 80 Days were shot here, with Lawachara standing in for India. Khasi, Tripura and Manipuri communities live in and around the park; two Khasi punjis, Lawachara and Magurchhara, lie inside it or at its edge.

On 14 June 1997 a blowout at the Magurchhara gas field burned about 700 acres of the reserve. Today the pressures are traffic, trains and crowds: the 20 km/h speed limit is widely ignored, animals are often killed by vehicles on the road, and encroachment eats into unmarked boundaries.

Satchari, Rema-Kalenga and the Sylhet forests

Satchari, about 243 hectares in Chunarughat upazila of Habiganj, became a national park on 10 October 2005; its name means seven streams. It has gibbons, capped langurs, Phayre's leaf monkeys, slow lorises, rhesus and pig-tailed macaques, and birds such as the Oriental pied hornbill and red-headed trogon. See the Habiganj chapter.

Rema-Kalenga Wildlife Sanctuary, also in Habiganj, is the largest of the division's protected forests at about 1,795 hectares and far quieter than Lawachara. Two small areas lie in Sylhet district: Khadimnagar National Park, about 679 hectares, declared on 13 April 2006, and Tilagarh Eco Park, about 45 hectares, set up the same year.

Ratargul and the swamp forests

Freshwater swamp forest once fringed much of the haor basin. Its best-known survivor is Ratargul, on the Gowain river in Gowainghat, about 26 km from Sylhet city: some 3,325 acres (1,345 hectares) of forest, whose 204-hectare core was declared a special biodiversity conservation area on 31 May 2015. Long called the country's only freshwater swamp forest, it now has known relatives such as Jugirkandi Mayabon and Lokkhi Baor, but none so famous.

Koroch is the commonest tree, with hijal, kadam and murta. In the monsoon, roughly June to September, though the water can arrive in May and linger into early October, it stands 3 m or more around the trunks and you tour by small wooden boat. From about December to April much of the forest floor dries out, though the channels and deeper hollows keep some water. You need a forest office ticket and a local boat.

Herons, egrets and kingfishers hunt the channels, and water monitors and snakes rest on low branches. In November 2025 a boat tour cost Tk 750 to 850 depending on the ghat and an adult ticket Tk 57.50; agree the price before you board.

Popularity is the problem: plastic snags in the branches, many boats carry no bins, and illegal China duari nets are set at night despite raids by forest staff, boatmen and the co-management committee. Go early on a weekday, ask for the quieter channels and carry your rubbish out.

Lawachara National ParkA tropical forest where western hoolock gibbons call from the canopy and a railway line cuts through.Satchari National ParkNamed for its seven streams, a hill forest with trails, a canopy tower and a Tripura village.Ratargul Swamp ForestOne of the few freshwater swamp forests in Bangladesh, explored by small wooden boat.

The animals to look for

Primates

Listen before you look: a gibbon family's loud, rising duet carries far, and Lawachara and Satchari are the best places to hear it. Capped langurs are easier to see, often feeding high in the trees, and Phayre's leaf monkey shares their forests. Macaques turn up at forest edges, while the nocturnal slow loris is rarely seen.

Birds

Lawachara alone has about 246 recorded bird species. In the forests look for the Oriental pied hornbill, red-headed trogon, red junglefowl and Cachar bulbul. From November to March the haors fill with ducks, geese, waders and raptors such as Pallas's fish eagle and the greater spotted eagle, with a few Baer's pochards in some winters.

Reptiles, butterflies and mammals

Lawachara has 29 reptile and 6 amphibian species, the Burmese python among them, and more than 160 butterflies, best looked for along sunlit streams. Water monitors are common around Ratargul, and the haors still hold freshwater turtles, though Ramsar notes they are widely hunted.

Larger mammals are shy and rarely seen. Barking deer, wild boar, leopard cats and the Chinese pangolin live in Lawachara; Hakaluki has otters, and dolphins have been recorded there; and Asian black bears and wild dogs survive in very small numbers around Satchari.

Seasons and good practice

When to go

• November to March: the best months for waterbirds. Migrants arrive after the monsoon and leave by late March, the main counts are held in January and February, and forest trails are dry.
• April and May: hot, with the haors at their lowest and early flash floods possible. The ducks have gone, so this is the leanest time for wildlife.
• June to October: the haors and Ratargul are at their fullest and the forests at their greenest, but expect mud and leeches.

In the forests, arrive when the gates open and avoid Fridays and holidays, when the parks fill with day-trippers. For weather by month, see When to go.

Watching wildlife responsibly

Most of the region's wildlife lives in small, busy reserves, so how visitors behave matters:

• Hire a trained local guide at the park office. Many trained under the Nishorgo programme, and the fee goes to people with a reason to protect the forest.
• Keep quiet and keep the group small; primates move away from shouting and music.
• Never feed monkeys or other wild animals, and do not play recorded calls to lure birds.
• Leave the drone in its bag over forests and bird sanctuaries unless the forest office has given written permission.
• Carry a refillable bottle, avoid single-use plastic and bring every wrapper back out.
• Never buy wild birds, turtles or bushmeat, and report nets or poisoned bait to the forest office.
• Drive slowly through Lawachara and Satchari, and keep off the railway line.

Threats, in plain words

Stone and sand extraction

The northern rivers carry stone from the hills, and after August 2024 its extraction turned into open looting: the administration estimated that Tk 200 crore of stone left Jaflong within days, and within a year the 15-acre tourist area at Sada Pathor in Bholaganj was stripped bare. Leasing of all 17 stone quarries in the country, eight of them in Sylhet, stopped in April 2025, yet reporters in 2026 still found digging at dawn and at night. Extraction tears up riverbeds, speeds erosion and has erased some hills.

Wetland loss

At Tanguar, one study found that in about three decades roughly two-fifths of the original haor had become farmland or settlement, and much of its deep water had turned into shallow rice land. Swamp forest survives in patches, silt is filling beels such as Baikka, and by one estimate, published in 2021, about 62 of the haor region's 140 fish species had nearly disappeared within a decade. Domestic ducks, cattle and boats disturb the birds, and waterbirds are still netted and poisoned.

Forest loss

Roads, railways and power lines cut the hill forests up, encroachers move in where boundaries are unmarked, and crowds, traffic and noise disturb breeding and feeding. At Lawachara a market has grown up inside the park, and boundary marking that began in October 2017 stopped part-way.

Floods

An untimely flash flood before the boro harvest can wipe out a farming family's year, and monsoon peaks cut roads and swamp homesteads. For travellers the lesson is simple: rivers here rise quickly after heavy rain in the hills, so heed weather warnings, never go out by boat in a storm, and accept a cancelled trip.

Conservation: who looks after it

Since the early 2000s Bangladesh has tried to share the management of these places with the people around them. The USAID-funded Nishorgo Support Project (2003 to 2008), run with the Forest Department, piloted co-management in five protected areas, among them Lawachara, Satchari and Rema-Kalenga. Its successors, the Integrated Protected Area Co-management project or IPAC (2008 to 2013) and the Climate-Resilient Ecosystems and Livelihoods project or CREL (2013 to 2017), extended it to 18 and then 22 areas.

The co-managed protected areas have committees of villagers, officials and others, backed by community patrol groups who walk the forest six to eight days a month, mostly as volunteers; three have been killed on duty since 2006. A 2012 amendment to the wildlife law gave the system legal standing. On the wetlands, the MACH project set up community bodies such as the one guarding Baikka Beel.

Results are mixed: researchers credit co-management with building local support, but the committees still lean on project money and do not always share in park ticket income. Your entry ticket, a local guide and a boatman from a nearby village are small but real contributions.

Read Responsible travel before you go, and pair this chapter with Sunamganj and the haors and Sreemangal and Moulvibazar for the practical detail of each area.