Two waterfalls are big tourist attraction in this area. The Athirapally and Vazhachal. I did a rather 'small' collection in Athirapally last year and landed a Travancoria Sp and a few Garra gotylas.
Athirapally was chosen as the collection spot. We reached the town of Chalakudy at around 5 AM and headed straight to the waterfall. Got down a coupla kilometres before the fall to check out the spot.
The first spot
The water was a clear and flowing. The temperature around 20 C. The river bed was primarily sand with a lotta boulders,rocks.Collecting here was a nightmare cos of the rocks and boulders on the bed. The species we spotted were :
Mesonemacheilus triangularis
Garra mullya
Garra gotyla
Barilius bakerii
Puntius fasciatus
Danio Sp
We were warned by the locals to beware of the Forest Department Guards crawling all around the place.
We collected our first fish in the second spot which was a few hundred metres upstream from the first spot.
Macrognathus aral???
Caught loads of Macrobrachium too.
With very little luck here too, we decided to hike straight too the falls as twas close to 11 AM by now. Stopped for an extremely fulfilling brunch consisting of Omlettes, Beef and boiled tapioca.
We decided to carry only our smaller hand nets to not attract undue attention.This is where I had collected the Travancoria and the Garras and so expectations were quite high. We spotted some humoungus Tor Sp and Barilius Sp. The water level was quite low compared to last time but collections still proved really tough here too.
Collected
Puntius species juvenile.
Note to Rupert and L Number Banana.The Danios here had fantastic orangish yellow on their dorsal and caudal. Im virtually illiterate when it comes to describing colours so bear with me. Black and blue are the only hues Im good at.
The Collection locality :
The flow here was greater but not the torrent twas last year. It was impossible to stand up without getting knocked back on the derriere the last time. Other parameters were similar to the first spot.
The Athirapally
Species Spotted :
Tor Sp
Barilius bakerii
Puntius Sp
Puntius fasciatus
Schismatorhynchos nukta (???)
Garra mullya
Garra gotyla
Danio Sp
This waterfall happens to be in the distribution of the rare Puntius chalakudiensis but they were nowhere to be seen.
Thoroughly irritated due to the lack of fish in our nets by now, we decided to head about 15 kms downstream to another town called Vettilapara. Some other people we know had collected here and had landed this guy :
To quote Michael Palin, I was foaming at the mouth and falling over backwards. This guy is in one of my tanks now. Anyone take a shot at IDing him????
This spot proved a little more feasible for collections. We managed to collect
Carinotetraodon travancoricus
Carinotetraodon imitator (???)
A splendid looking Aplocheilus lineatus.
The Spot.
The flow was much slower here and the temperature just a little bit higher. The river bed was the same here too.
All picture credits to my friend Madhu.
Twas around 3 PM by then we had to wrap up as we had a train to catch back. Whats a good collection trip without some good food????? More beef,Omlettes and Parotta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parotta). Parotta is a locally prepared dish and was my staple diet until a few years ago. Not healthy enough they say...... Bah!!!!!
I have heard of reports of a Glyptothorax species found in this area too and I think thats a good enough reason to head back in a few months time.
Next time Il make sure there a lotta pics. Not that twas hard. Just that we were looking for some other fish and we just sorta glanced at these and let 'em be. 
