Deosai Wildlife: Brown Bears, Marmots and Birds

Deosai wildlife is built around one animal: the Himalayan brown bear. The plateau was made a national park in 1993 to save it, when fewer than twenty bears were left, and the Gilgit-Baltistan wildlife department's 2022 survey estimated 66 in the park and its buffer valleys. In summer almost every visitor sees golden marmots and birds of prey; some see a bear, usually at a distance, early in the morning or late in the afternoon.

This guide covers the bear's story and why numbers have stalled, where and when to look, how to watch without putting yourself or the animals at risk, and the other mammals and birds of the plateau.

The Himalayan brown bear: why Deosai matters

The Himalayan brown bear is a subspecies of brown bear found in the western Himalaya, Karakoram and Hindu Kush. Across most of that range it has been pushed out: bears were killed for their fat, and cubs were taken for bear baiting. In Pakistan the Deosai plateau is its last real stronghold, and the park's own survey calls the population there the country's largest.

When the park was set up, only around 19 bears were counted. With protection, and a long conservation project run by the Himalayan Wildlife Foundation before the government's forest and wildlife department took over management, numbers climbed. Surveys counted about 43 in 2008 and 56 in 2013. The 2022 survey estimated 66, and at the upper end of its range, 77.

That growth has slowed. Conservationists quoted by Dawn in 2023 said numbers had been flat for several years and pointed to disturbance: livestock grazing on the plateau, and traffic that has grown from 25 to 40 cars when the park opened to more than 500 vehicles. Three bears were fitted with GPS collars to study how they move and feed. The 2022 survey found herders' camps with thousands of goats and sheep on and around the plateau, and recommended ending grazing permissions and banning private hotels and restaurants inside the park.

The bears are not only a sight for visitors. They are a small, slow-breeding population, and what visitors do on the plateau affects them.

Where and when you might see a bear

Brown bears come out of their winter dens in spring and are active through the whole visitor season, feeding hard in late summer before they den again in autumn. They eat mostly plants, grasses, roots and flowers, but they also dig out marmots, which is why you sometimes see a bear working at a hillside of burrows.

They feed mainly in the early morning and again later in the afternoon. The middle of the day, when most day-trippers arrive, is the least likely time.

The 2022 survey recorded bears right across the plateau: around Bara Pani, Kala Pani, the Shatung stream, the Sheosar Lake area and even near Ali Malik Mar on the rim. There is no single "bear spot". What helps:

• Start early. Leaving Skardu around 6 or 7 puts you on the plateau in the morning feeding hours.
• Bring binoculars. Most sightings are a brown shape moving slowly on a far slope or along a stream.
• Stop and scan. Pull over somewhere with a wide view and look for a few minutes, rather than scanning from a moving jeep.
• Ask your driver. Drivers who go up most days know where bears have been seen that week.

Plenty of people cross the plateau and see none. That is normal, and no month guarantees one. Our guide to the best time to visit Deosai covers which months combine active bears with fewer people.

How to watch a bear without harming it, or yourself

A few rules make almost every sighting safe:

1. Stay in or right beside the vehicle. If a bear is within a few hundred metres, watch from inside.
2. Never approach on foot, however far away it looks. Bears cover open ground far faster than a person can run.
3. Keep your distance in the vehicle too. If the bear stops feeding, stares at you or moves away, you are too close. Back off.
4. Don't follow or block it. Don't drive after a bear, cut across its path, or box it in with other vehicles.
5. Stay on the existing track. The flat plateau makes it easy to drive anywhere, and the park survey noted vehicles going to almost every corner. Off-track driving scars the grass and disturbs animals far from the road.
6. Keep quiet. No horns, no shouting, no music.
7. Never feed a bear. A local news investigation in 2025 found bears being fed biscuits, roti and leftovers. A bear that links people with food becomes a danger, and a danger to itself.
8. Take every scrap of rubbish with you, including fruit peel and tissues.

The pressures on the bears are real. In September 2025 a male bear was found dead on the plateau; a post-mortem blamed trampling by a livestock herd, and parts of the carcass had been removed, which led to a police case. The park has a small staff for an area of more than 3,000 square kilometres, so how visitors behave matters.

Golden marmots

The animal you will certainly see is the golden marmot, known elsewhere as the long-tailed marmot. Colonies live in burrows along the track, and in summer the marmots sit up beside their holes, whistle a sharp alarm when anything comes near, and vanish underground.

They hibernate through the long winter, so the summer weeks are their whole feeding year. Please don't feed them. The park's bear survey includes a photograph of a marmot eating discarded tissue paper, and fed marmots learn to hang around vehicles, where they get hit. They are also food for bears, foxes, wolves and eagles, which is part of why the plateau supports so much else.

Other mammals

These are present but seen far less often:

• Tibetan wolf. Usually alone or in small groups, crossing the open grass at a steady trot.
• Tibetan red fox. Sometimes seen near marmot colonies, especially early and late.
• Himalayan ibex. On the rocky slopes around the edges of the plateau rather than on the flat grassland.
• Snow leopard. Recorded in the park, but a sighting from the road would be extraordinary.
• Stone marten and mountain weasel. Small, quick and easy to miss.

The rivers hold native snow trout, which grow large in the cold, clear water.

Birds of prey and other birds

Over 120 species of resident and migratory birds have been recorded on Deosai, and the park lies within an area BirdLife International treats as important for birds found only in the western Himalaya. For most visitors, though, the birds that stand out are the big raptors:

• Golden eagle, often hunting marmots
• Lammergeier, the bearded vulture, with its long wedge-shaped tail
• Himalayan griffon vulture, huge and pale, circling high on thermals
• Laggar and peregrine falcons, kestrel and sparrowhawk

On the ground, listen for the calls of Himalayan snowcock and chukar partridge on the slopes. Binoculars make more difference to birdwatching here than any lens.

Is a wildlife day on Deosai for you?

It is for people who enjoy watching and waiting. Deosai is not a safari park with guaranteed sightings, and the best moments tend to come from sitting quietly with binoculars rather than driving fast from one stop to the next. Photographers need a long lens: a bear at a respectful distance is small in a phone photo.

Children usually love the marmots, and a distant bear through binoculars can be the highlight of a trip. Keep them in the vehicle whenever a bear is in view.

If you want time to wait for wildlife, give the plateau more than a single rushed day. Our seven-day Skardu and Deosai trip gives Deosai two days, with early starts. For the routes and rules, see our Deosai National Park guide, and the Gilgit-Baltistan forest and wildlife department's page on the park.

Frequently asked questions