Wildlife Highlights India: A walk through the Western Ghats
In part 2 of a 4 part series about wildlife in India, Annie and Adele take us on a walk through the Western Ghats…
Illustration by Katie de Lusignan.
I had seen fireflies before, but never as many as the night the stars fell into the trees. We drove through the darkness of the jungle and it seemed like there was no divide between earth and sky - like at any second we could drive off the face of the Earth. But in reality, what we were really doing was much more mundane. We were surveying the jungle bird biodiversity in the Western Ghats.
The Western Ghats are a range of mountains along the western front of the Indian peninsula, stretching over 1,6000 kms. It is teeming with flora and fauna, including many species which cannot be found anywhere else in the world. This region is one of the world's eight biodiversity hotspots and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The state that I am from, Goa, is hidden within the Ghats and blends city-life and wilderness in a way that is incomprehensible to anyone that hasn’t been there before.
The night I saw the fireflies set the trees ablaze, our group of bird enthusiasts had parked off the dirt road and walked about a kilometre or two by torchlight. There was no moon to light our way and I tried not to trip over my own feet while aiming my torch at the foliage along the path in an attempt to catch the light reflecting off whatever large prey may have been stalking us while we listened for the call of the elusive Nightjar. With my thoughts pre-occupied by leopard and tiger sneak attacks, I never noticed the Nightjar nesting among the dry leaves just off the path. Even under the light of our torches, it took me a while to realise that what at first glance looked like a piece of dry wood was really a mother Nightjar foraging with her brood. I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to see these beautiful birds, they looked so small and vulnerable in the dangerous jungle, which made me think about how fragile nature is when it is up against the wheels of progress.
Savanna Nightjar (Caprimulgus affinis) by Ravi Vaidyanathan CC-BY-SA-3.0
The next day, we went on an early morning bird walk through the thick jungle foliage to look for more jungle birds. A troop of monkeys let out a bellowing screech and all of a sudden the forest seemed to hold its breath. I should have known that that was a sign that something was near. Even the herd of Gaur, Indian bison with white legs that always made me think that they were wearing knee-high white socks, seemed to pass us in a hurry, but this city girl did not know that the silence was not a good sign. Our guard recommended that we cut our study short and head straight back to our car. As we drove toward the gates, he shouted, “Bagheera! Bagheera!” and we stopped to look.
The leopard out of my car window. Can you spot it? Image by Annie Megan Santamaria
I saw nothing as I scanned the dried leaves, but the guard and the other person in the car with me were excited by what they saw outside. It took a while for my eyes to resolve the leopard poised near the watering hole, surrounded by the dull brown foliage, seemingly ready to cover the alarmingly short distance between us.
There is a saying that for every tiger the hunter spots, ten tigers spot the hunter. Being watched by an apex predator and knowing that your life depends on whether or not it thinks that you would make a tasty snack really puts things in perspective. I don’t think I’ll ever worry about something as banal as missing a deadline again.
But this encounter did make me think about what it must be like to live in a village skirting the jungle. I think I better understand why people rush to kill wild animals in what can sometimes be perceived as a “kill or be killed” situation. When I visited Agumbe, a village in the Western Ghats, we were told that if we got bitten by one of the Big Four (the four most venomous snakes in India - the Common Krait, Russell’s Viper, Indian Cobra and Saw-scaled Viper) then there was only one thing left to do - phone home. I think I understand the thought process that people must have when encountering an animal that can end their lives at any second. In truth, most animals would prefer flight over fight and will only attack when threatened.
The problem lies in the fact we seem to be in a turf war with wildlife and this means that man-animal conflict is becoming more of a common occurrence. In India in the past five years, over 2,000 human and 500 elephant deaths have occurred because of human-elephant conflict. This is a major problem along the Western Ghats, especially along the elephant corridors that connect the states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, as elephants stray out of the corridors and into nearby villages and fields in search of food or alternate routes. Despite government efforts, there has not been a resolution to this complicated problem as habitat boundaries , radio tagging the matriarch or setting up bee boxes along boundaries to deter elephants has proven ineffective.
This poses the question, how can urbanisation and wildlife conservation co-exist? In a country where a large percentage of the population still lives in poverty, development is a necessity. We have to learn to grow with nature instead of replacing it. But how do we try our best to conserve the wildlife endemic to the Ghats without compromising on development? This has been achieved in small measures in some urban spaces like Goa, where the city grows alongside national parks and wildlife sanctuaries. But there remains a necessity not only for government backing but also public push to preserve the remaining biodiversity hotspots.
In Bangalore, a mega city in India, without much protection from government policy, wildlife seems to have found a way to survive. There are slender loris living in the trees on campus at the Indian Institute of Science, a plethora of tree-dwelling tarantulas living peacefully in the parks that hundreds of people visit every week and cobras commonly sighted in residential areas. I have even seen a mongoose rummaging through the rubbish as I waited at a signal light near my house. None of these species have been intentionally protected, which raises the question of what we could accomplish if we really tried to conserve and protect nature.
Thank you to Katie de Lusignan for her beautiful illustrations. You can find more of her work on her Instagram @katieponks
This article is the second of a four-part series on India’s biodiversity and varied ecology.
Adele Santamaria
Adele is currently in her last year of her degree in English, Journalism and Psychology. She loves writing and believes in writing about important world issues to try to bring about change. Annie is an MSc. graduate from the University of Exeter. She is passionate about her research and aspires to make a positive impact on human and animal welfare. You can find her on Instagram @adele_santamaria_
Annie Megan Santamaria
Annie is an MSc. graduate from the University of Exeter with interests in disease evolution. She is passionate about her research and aspires to make a positive impact on human and animal welfare. Annie was a part of the editorial team at Gubbi Labs where she managed an online science news journal and created graphics, podcasts and wrote pieces on scientific developments. Her goal is to bridge the gap between the researcher and the public by making science more accessible and easy to understand.