Placing predators in land of 1.1 billion people

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:

 

 

Placing predators in land of 1.1 billion people

 

 

Indian tigers, lions, and leopards who menace humans or

livestock are killed, as predators are in other nations--but Indian

animal advocates have long sought alternatives.

The tiger conservationist Jim Corbett, born in India of

British parents, first won fame by shooting the tigers he

memorialized in his 1946 memoir The Man-Eaters of Kumaon. Yet far

from boasting of his kills, Corbett pleaded for tiger habitat to be

set aside, within which tigers could be tigers, safe from the

threat of human encroachment.

Though tiger reserves were eventually created, as Corbett

recommended, and one of the largest was named in his honor,

poaching and encroachment have diminished most of them. The Sariska

tiger reserve, formerly among the most accessible to tourists, was

apparently poached completely out of tigers in 2003, as was

officially confirmed in November 2004. Poachers admitted killing 10

of the 20-odd tigers who were believed to have inhabited Sariska.

The rest appeared to have existed only on paper as result of counts

inflated to keep tourists coming.

Tiger attacks have declined with the tiger population, from

about two dozen a year when India was believed to have several

thousand wild tigers, to fewer than half a dozen per year recently.

Current data indicates that India may now have less than 1,500 wild

tigers. The most recent official tiger counts, putting the numbers

over 2,000, have been widely discredited. A new official count is

due to be completed later in 2007.

Asiatic lion attacks have long been rare partly because of

the extreme rarity of Asiatic lions. But this may be changing.

The last remaining Asiatic lion habitat, the Gir Forest in

Gujarat state, was protected in 1907 by order of the Nawab of

Junagadh. The Gir Forest lion population soared from just 13 when

the Nawab acted, to 219 in 1950 to 285 by 1963, fell to 177 by

1968, and climbed back to 359 in 2005.

During the past 50 years, however, human encroachment

shrank the protected area from more than 4,000 square kilometers to

barely 1,400. As many as 90 lions now live outside the protected

area, leading to incidents like the reported invasion of Virpur

village by a pride of seven lions on January 5, 2005.

" The lions killed 35 goats, four wild pigs, and an ox, "

Virpur resident Kanubhai Kothiya told the Times of India. " One or

two lions stray into the village every week, but this was an army. "

Even within the protected zone, encroachment is an

increasing threat, Gujarat SPCA representative Snehal Bhatt recently

detailed to fellow members of the Asian Animal Protection Network.

Hugely outnumbered, and often related to the offenders, the local

forest guards and other authorities mostly look away, Bhatt charged.

Boasts by Gir officials that poaching has been suppressed

have been followed at least twice in two years by discoveries of

poached carcasses, stripped of marketable body parts. Most

recently, two lionesses and a cub were poached circa March 1, 2007.

Thirty-seven recent instances are known of Asiatic lions

falling into deep open-pit wells, of whom only 18 were pulled out

alive, Gujarat forest minister Mangubhai Patel told news media on

March 6. Suspicion that many of these incidents are caused by people

seeking to kill lions rose after tire tracks showed that someone

apparently chased two cubs into a well, where they were found dead

on February 24.

" There have been calls for some lions to be moved to a second

reserve, to give them more space, " Independent Delhi correspondent

Justin Haggler reported on March 9. " A site has been found, at the

Kuno wildlife sanctuary in the neighbouring state of Madhya Pradesh.

The idea is backed by the central government in Delhi, and by the

Wildlife Institute of India. But the Gujarat state government has

opposed the move, saying the lions are a symbol of pride for Gujarat.

" Leading opposition to the relocation is Gujarat chief

minister Narendra Modi, who cannot travel to Britain, " Haggler

noted, " because of calls for him to be prosecuted under

international law for the Gujarat massacres [of Muslims, by Hindu

nationalists who accused Muslims of starting a deadly train fire] in

2002. "

Leopards have no protected habitat designated especially for

them. Officially, about 14,000 leopards survive in India, some in

forest reserves, many in farming areas where they are blamed for

killing cattle, sheep, goats, and at least 33 humans during the

past three years.

The human victims are typically women and children who are

pounced while collecting windfallen wood or fruits under trees where

leopards lurk in ambush for deer, their primary prey.

Leopards found close to human habitation are often

live-trapped to be relocated, but lack of places to put them leads

to headlines like, " Leopard saved, now what? " , in the February

12, 2007 edition of the Telegraph of India.

" A few days ago, " explained Teleg-raph reporter Roopak

Goswami, " when a leopard who strayed into a busy area of

Bhaskarnagar was tranquillized and captured, many felt it was a job

well done. But for the Forest Department, it was an addition to a

problem--the lack of a proper place to rehabilitate big cats who

wander out of their habitat. "

A leopard, for example, can only be released into an area

" within range of the spot it is rescued from, with an adequate prey

base, sufficient water, and most importantly, away from human

settlements, " Assam State Zoo divisional forest officer Narayan

Mahanta told Goswami.

Wrote Goswami, " Most often, these big cats are rescued from

hillock areas of the city, " where isolated islands of habitat are

surrounded by dense suburbs.

" It is very difficult to release them in these places, as

the residents will protest, " Mahantas said.

The Assam State Zoo added the leopard to a caged leopard

collection already numbering a dozen.

Housing more than 700 animals of 45 species, in just 47

enclosures on a 430-acre site, the Assam State Zoo recently

announced a 20-year improvement plan focused on conservation breeding

and research.

 

 

 

--

Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

 

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Fax: 360-579-2575

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