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THEKKADY: The
morning mist lifts gradually over the Periyar river to give
us a glimpse of the forests which form the tiger reserve.
As the motor-boat moves towards the lake formed as a
consequence of the first of four dams on the Periyar, we
peer into the undergrowth to spot wildlife. Before us, from
the river bed rise ancient tree trunks, remnants of the
receding river waters which once had submerged a part of the
forest tract that surrounds us. These form the nesting
grounds of cormorants and darters.
The snake-like dark head of a darter plops up in front of
the boat. Suddenly it takes flight and flops towards its
progeny propped up on the branch of a large tree screeching
their demand for food. Large birds need large trees for
nests that the Periyar sanctuary possesses. Not so, the
Thattekad bird sanctuary which we visit later. Sankaran,
who worked with Salim Ali for 16 years and now looks after
Kerala’s only bird sanctuary, says that it is unable to
attract the bigger birds; we will, for instance, not come
across the great Indian hornbill at Thattekad for it does
not have trees of sufficient girth and size. But we see one
at the Periyar sanctuary. The hornbill is in no hurry. He
glides casually over the boat, showing off his gorgeous
yellow stripe stretching across the entire wing span. We
see this endangered bird once again on the return journey
peering at us down his hooded beak. He is as curious about
us as we are about him.
We spy a lion tailed macaque, another endangered species,
his dark tail stretching rope-like from a branch of a tall
tree. This giver is away for not until he almost
disappeared from sight does he look up and we get a glimpse
of his mane of long grey hair drooping from his head and
cheeks.
The members of the National Environment Awareness Campaign
Empowered Committee (NEAC) of the Ministry of Environment
and Forests, visiting the sanctuary are, however, not
impressed by the gaur (mistakenly called the Indian bison),
feeding in the luxurious valley of the ghats mantled by a
patch of evergreen forest. But for his white stockings, he
is no different than the buffalo.
As part of their task of keeping an eye on NGOs working on
environmental issue the NEAC committee members also visit
the Chilika wetland some months earlier, a few hours drive
from Bhubaneshwar. The controversy surrounding it, in the
main, revolves around overfishing of prawns by industrial
houses. These fetch fancy prices abroad for the Chilika
prawn has a flavour all its own.
The NGOs maintain that overfishing has impinged on the
livelihood of the fishermen living in the 119 villages
dotted around the largest brackish water lake in Asia (a
Ramsar convention site), and what is more, endangered the
fauna of the area.
As the motor-boat takes the NEACcommittee members from
Balugaon towards the light-house watch tower we see the lake
filled with brahminy ducks, as also coots, bareheaded goose,
pelicans, wag-tails and clackwinged stilts. Their habitat
is under threat also from the 52 rivulets and nallahs that
carry pesticides and fertilizers, as well as industrial
wastes, when they empty into the Chilika. The authorities
have not even been able to get rid of the reed infestation,
so all encompassing at the Balugaon jetty.
The Chilika issue has become “political”. It is no longer a
question of small fishermen’s livelihood threatened by the
over exploitation of multinationals only interested in the
export market. The NGOs inform us that many of the 65
fishermen co-operatives are also keen on the export market;
these are apparently controlled by “outsiders”, and hence
the danger to the flora and fauna of this unique wetland
comes from several quarters.
Both at Periyar and Chilika the NEAC members come across a
range of wildlife and avian species. So what if they do not
see tigers at the tiger reserve, or even the elephants for
which the Periyar sanctuary is famous (though now thanks to
poaching, the elephants being produced by the herds are
without tusks. That is evolution, or if you like, survival
of the species for you). It is not uncommon for visitors to
sanctuaries to return without having seen any animals, other
than the domestic variety that have strayed into them to
graze on the grasslands. I remember the futile visit to
watch lions in their natural habitat at the Gir national
park. We had to be content with having seen the natural
habitat. Miles and miles of the forest area was covered by
the jeep but not a sign of the king.
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The
Periyar tiger reserve in the Idukki district of Kerala
forms part of the high ranges on the western ghats.
In the north central part is the famous Periyar lake,
a vast reservoir of water created by a dam on the
Periyar river, which was built in 1895. The forests
around the lake were declared reserve forests as early
as 1899. Since then the area has been witnessing
various conservation and protection measures to keep
undamaged the habitat and the wildlife. These measures
have had varying degrees of success till 1978 when the
Periyar sanctuary was declared a tiger reserve under
Project Tiger. The reserve covers hills and verdant
forests extending over an area of 777 sq.km.
Excerpt in December and January, the area receives
rain throughout the year. However, the bulk of the
rain comes from the south-west monsoons during May to
July. The average annual rainfall is 2500 mm. The
Periyar river and its various tributaries and the lake
are the perennial sources of water in the sanctuary.
The types of forests in this tiger reserve are
grasslands, moist deciduous, tropical evergreen and
semi-evergreen. Grasslands covering a little more
than 10 sq. km. Occur around the Periyar lake and on
the islets of the lake, interspersed with wooden areas
. There is scattered growth of firehardy species.
The main species are elephant grass, sachurum, etc.,
which are commonly grazed by elephants, deer and gaur.
Moist deciduous forests occur interspersed with
grasslands around the lake and along the slopes on the
north and north eastern boundary covering about 100
sq. km. With Terminalia species dominating while a
small percent of teak and rosewood also exist.
Semi-evergreen forests are usually adjacent to
tropical evergreen and also on the sides of streams .
They hold a mix of evergreen and deciduous trees.
Nearly 40 per cent – 305 sq. km. – of the sanctuary is
covered by tropical evergreen forests with lofty
trees. They are dense with thick underwood and
herbs. Plantation of Eucalyptus has been undertaken
in about 55 sq. km. area since 1962.
The wide variety of habitats in the reserve support a
number of different species of terrestrial birds.
Aquatic bird life is rather poor apparently because
the waters of the lake are deep. On the whole nearly
160 species of birds have been identified. The common
aquatic birds are the Indian darter and the
blacknecked stork. Other important birds are the
great Indian hornbill, brahminy kite, black winged
kite, little cormorant, pied kingfisher, golden
oriole, etc.
There is a wide range of herbivores, carnivores and
omnivores in the Periyar tiger reserve. Resident and
migrating elephants are common in the forests. Other
animals, with their latest population survey figures
in brackets, are: sambar (452), muntjak or barking
deer (50), mouse deer (50), wild boar (500), gaur
(100), blacknaped hare (20), porcupine (45)), giant
squirrel (150), Nilgiri langur (170 troops), bonnet
macaque (10 troops), liontailed macaque (11 troops).
The chief predators of the reserve are tiger, panther
and wild dogs. There are about 40 tigers and 15
panthers in the forest while some 50 packs of wild
dogs also exist.
(Kerala forest dept., wildlife wing) |
The use of modern techniques and facilities by poachers ha
led to the systematic decimation of wildlife. Only in the
core areas are animals still to be found and since visitors
cannot venture within, they may see some game such as mouse
deer, barking deer, wild boar, but not the animals at the
top of the wildlife chain. These only the wildlife wardens,
and of course poachers, have the privilege of viewing.
In the sixties, however, wildlife had not become scarce and
during a school-the Chila shooting block (now a wildlife
sanctuary in Garhwal) we saw so —-of it that it would be
even difficult to conceive of such abundance now. We were
all on elephant back, moving in a line across the jungle,
and the thrill of it all as reflected on the faces of
Sajirao Gaekwad, Vikram Thapar, Kamal Nath and Ishaat
Hussain has been captured by my box camera. It took better
photographs than the more complicated gadgets I have
acquired since (that is not a reflection on the gadgets).
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The Chilika wetland, on
the Orissa coast with an area of 1,000 sq. km., is
famous for its high concentration of feathered winter
migrants. Out of this Nalabana, a submergible island
with an area of 15.5 sq.km., has been declared as a
sanctuary due to its varied floral and faunal
composition including a large concentration of avi-fauna.
While a number of rivers and rivulets drain into this
lake, it is connected to the sea by a 35 km. long
channel. A number of islands dotting the lake lend
charm to this beautiful land. The prominent among
them is the abode of Maa Kalijai whose omnipresence
lends strength and courage to the ever daring
boatmen. This vast water body also supports a large
fishing community who enhance the beauty of the lake
with their traditional colourful sail boats. Their
navigational expertise is reminiscent of the ancient
maritime heritage of the Kalinga Sadhavas. The entire
lake area has been declared as a “closed area” to
provide much needed protection to the avian visitors.
Besides a variety of micro-organisms, insects, fishes
and amphibians the following higher order of fauna are
seen in and around Chilika:
There are 150 species of birds here including 93
migratory species. They are white bellied sea eagles,
brahminy kites, pariah kites, darters, cormorants,
terns, sea gulls. Flamingoes, teals, barheaded geese,
greylag geese, coots, brahminy ducks, pochards,
widgeons, shovellers, white ibis egrets, purple
moorhen, jacanas and herons. The neighbouring sandy
stretches and hills have a good number of black bucks,
cheetals, fishing cats, mongoose, hares, rhesus
monkeys, hyaenas , and porcupines besides a good
dolphin population near the channel connecting the
sea. Some water snakes are seen in the lake. Olive
Ridley turtles nest sporadically on the beach. There
are monitor lizards and cobras on the surrounding
land.
(Extract from
the pamphlet produced by the forest department, Orissa) |
That evening we had venison for dinner, sitting around a
camp-fire overlooked by a star-studded sky that has a
special either in the wilderness, or in the mountains.
Among the latter, it is the mountain goat that provides
exciting sport to the shikari and during the Jaonli
Garhwal expedition, Hari Dang took a difficult shot at a
ghooral. Down it rolled from on high to the lower slopes
and slithered past me some ten feet away, its sad eyes still
open, the blood spurting from its mouth patterning the snow
with deep red. That was the one time I could have been
persuaded to turn vegetarian. But since then, several
appeals of which Maneka Gandhi’s on TV is undeniably the
most effective, have not touched me: the carnivore in me has
prevailed.
The other elephant ride that remains in my memory is the one
through the Kaziranga national park. That was in the
seventies and the one-horned rhinos stood unperturbed,
unmoved, stolid, in couples and triples as our elephant
ambulated across the tall grass. There were so many of them
that one tended to become blasé. In the evening we settled
down to a substantial dinner served at the Kaziranga Forest
Lodge – run by the ITDC – and the best Bloody Mary’s I have
tasted. The present-day visitors to Kaziranga rarely spot
the one-horned rhino, for it has been slaughtered for its
horn, in great demand as an aphrodisiac among the Arab
states, I am given to understand (even as our tigers’ bones
are smuggled to China to be used in formulations to cure
this sick).
To come back to the Periyar (Thekkady) sanctuary, the
visitor is lucky to see whatever game he does, for the
Wildlife Act has not been able to prevent the destruction of
the forests. And the NEAC committee members were fortunate
to sight two of the endangered species, one of them the
macaque, to protect which the dam project in the Silent
Valley was dumped. It also contains the only tropical rain
forest belt in the country, with the exception of the
Andamans and the Pooyamkutty area. In fact, the committee
members later sailed up the Periyar to the point where it
meets the Pooyamkutty river on one side of which are nutmeg
and clove plantations. The Kerala government is putting
pressure on the Centre to let it build a dam on the
Pooyamkutty – some 20 km from where it merges with Periyar.
This will involve the submergence of 3,000 hectares of prime
forest land with several endemic species. The
environmentalists have been campaigning against it. Will
they succeed, or will again political considerations
prevail?
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