| The first news is that the work to “protect” the statue of the reclining Vishnu has been stopped. When I left the park at the end of last season the view at Sheshaiyya was quite depressing. The vegetation from around the statue area had been cleared and a set of ugly scaffolding poles cemented in place to take a canopy to keep off the weather. Fortunately a court order was obtained preventing further work, and by the time we arrived at the beginning of November the poles had been removed and the vegetation was starting to grow back. It will take a couple of years, but hopefully the place will return to the peaceful, green oasis that it was before. |
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| The Reclining Vishnu returning to normal ; early morning in the park |
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| Early appearances can be deceptive. In the autumn sun the park and surrounding areas looked green and lush. The park meadows had their normal cover of tall elephant grasses, the white feathery heads providing a spectacular view in the early morning, and the farm fields had contrasting splashes of colour provided by the crops of mustard and lentils. However, the monsoon had not provided as much rain as normal, and the area was some 50cm short of its usual level of 180cm. The annual cycle relies on the sandstone absorbing water during the monsoon and then releasing it to the streams and waterholes during the dry season. It was anticipated that there would be water shortages later in the season and by April, Gupalpur waterhole was as low as I have ever seen it. Jhurjura and Mahaman waterholes were completely dry. The main streams and water sources should retain water until the next monsoon in June, giving the animals chance to seek alternatives (territorial disputes notwithstanding) but life for the local farmers is very difficult at the moment. Everybody is hoping for a full monsoon this summer. |
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| Village girl watching over the crops ; a typical farm ; bullock cart |
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| November 2007 |
| The other animals are as much a part of the experience of Bandhavgarh as the tigers. The elephants have a new camp on the northern boundary of the park, and in the afternoon their mahouts take them to bathe in one of the nearby streams. We happened to meet them on the tracks one afternoon as they returned to the camp, and the baby elephant decided that it would be a good idea to chase the jeep. Mother and aunt decided the little one needed back up, so we reversed down the track with the three elephants following us in a cloud of dust. |
| This time of year is also good for observing spiders, and the golden web spiders in particular are very adept at stringing webs across large gaps. If you drive along the less frequented tracks in the park you need to be very careful about standing up in the jeeps whilst moving, in case you have a closer encounter than you had bargained for! As with any time of year, the bird life was spectacular. |
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| Common Kingfisher ; baby elephant on the charge ; golden web spider |
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| Sukhipattya was still in residence on the far western side of the park, and still as secretive as ever. During the monsoon, one of her three cubs had disappeared, but the other two were healthy and now fourteen months old. We had a single sighting of the two for about half an hour. Their mother had left them well hidden among the trees, and they waited quietly until they heard her calling on her return. The two cubs moved away into the forest, and we were treated to a range of vocalisations as the three tigers communicated with each other as they headed for a rendezvous that was unseen by us. |
| We had begun to think that Mahaman was incapable of having cubs. The previous season she had been seen mating with a number of males without success. At least, that was what we thought. In May 2007 she gave birth to a litter of 4 cubs, with Boka being the father. This is a significant event for the park, not only for the increase in population, but because Boka’s bloodline carries genes that are outside of Sita and Charger’s lineage. All the cubs were seen regularly, but were fairly shy, staying away from the road in the forest. Mahaman was also wary of vehicles, and when crossing the forest tracks would do so at a fast pace, with half a snarl directed to the nearest jeep for good measure. |
| Chorbera’s two cubs were all but separated from their mother, being nearly two years old. With the increasing number of adult tigers in the northern part of the park, these two maturing tigers have been pushed ever closer to the fringes of the Tala Range. During the autumn we saw mother and the male cub, but not the female. The male has been named Chobana, which means “one who bites”, in reference to the fatal attack on a villager in February 2007. The family’s territory comprises parts of both Tala and Khitauli Ranges, and they are frequently seen crossing the main road to Umaria that forms the boundary between the two. |
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| One of the major principles of animal conservation is the preservation of migration routes, so it came as a surprise to find that during the summer the Forest Department had erected a 2½ metre high chain link fence for about 2km along the edge of the road, stretching away from Tala in the direction of Umaria. This naturally caused problems for both the tigers and other animals, and Chobana was soon seen by locals trying and failing to jump the fence. Deflected from his normal route, he ended up frequenting the outskirts of Tala and began preying on cattle. His reputation only compounded the readily generated hysteria, and it was not long before suggestions of transporting the unfortunate tiger to Bhopal zoo began to surface. Fortunately the situation resolved itself after a couple of weeks as Chobana found his way back into the relative sanctuary of the park. I found it particularly depressing that, once again, humans had created a problem for the wildlife and then promptly blamed the animals for the consequences. |
| The second dominant male in the park, Boka, continued to push from the west into Bandar’s territory and had occasionally been seen as far east as Chakradhara meadow. The two tigers had a couple of minor altercations, with Bandar being able to hold his own against his rival. At the moment Bandar’s experience is still compensating for Boka’s age advantage. |
| A dominant male’s life consists of patrolling his territory, mating with the females that he finds there (whether or not he is related to them), and finding food. The food part of the equation is often dealt with by helping himself to the females’ kills, though they are capable of making their own kills should the need arise. The life is fairly solitary and they can cover huge distances in a day. This makes them difficult to find and sightings are more rare than of the females who cover smaller territories. |
| In the past I have spent a whole season without seeing Bandar at all, so I was particularly excited to catch up with him walking down the road at 6.45 one morning. We were at the front of a small group of jeeps being led down the road by the tiger, who wasn’t in the least interested in us. He only had eyes (and nose) for the track in front of him. After a couple of minutes he veered off the track into the forest and began to sniff and scratch at one of the trees, marking his territory. Anticipating what was going to happen next, we drove a hundred metres or so down the track and waited, the other jeeps staying where they were. Sure enough, after a brief pause Bandar rejoined the track and began to walk towards us, and we spent the next couple of minutes playing stop and go as we roughly matched his progress. In the end he came so close that he was inside the minimum focussing distance for the lens that I was using, and so I lowered the camera to view him with the naked eye, which immediately resulted in a muttered expletive as I realised just how close he was. The feeling was one of awe rather than fear since Bandar showed not the slightest inclination to threaten us, even though he was close enough to touch, and with a sideways glance he passed the tailgate of the jeep and angled away into the forest. |
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Bandar on patrol in the early morning
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| Chakradhara’s last litter, fathered by Bandar, were now almost three years old and had completely separated from their mother. Although they were generally being pushed toward the north east boundary of the park, sightings were still being made, particularly of one of the males. We had a couple of good sightings of him, one of which proved to be my final sighting before a premature departure back to the UK. Having spent a lot of time working within feet of one of nature’s most powerful hunters, it was ironic that I should fall victim to one of its smallest, the mosquito. The local clinic was superb in treating the initial attack of malaria, but after a second bout I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and took an early flight home. The good news was that the strain I caught was the curable one, and after a couple of sessions at the local hospital I’m clear for the future. As it was, my last sighting was between the two attacks, and turned out to be this young male standing on a hillside surveying what might, one day, be part of his own kingdom. |
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| Male from Chakradhara's last litter |
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| A couple of weeks after I returned home, I received news that a very small cub had been found in the area normally frequented by Banbai. After observing the cub for a couple of hours, the Forest Department decided that the best option was to take the cub into care, and it was soon sent to Bhopal zoo for treatment. There was no sign of Banbai or any other cubs even though an extensive search was made. This remained the case throughout December and January. |
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| February, March and April 2008 |
| The climate had a surprise in store when we arrived in the middle of February. Normally there are only a few days of the season, at the end of December and the beginning of January, when the temperatures dip to zero and leave a touch of ground frost on the main meadow in the mornings. It was very cold in the mornings and for a four day period all the meadows had heavy frost. Whilst everybody had heeded the advice to bring fleeces, hats and gloves, more drastic action was needed for the early morning drives. Several blankets and hot water bottles in the jeeps served to keep the circulation going until the sun came up to warm the park. These were days of extremes; below zero at 6 am and 25C by 9.30 am, then cooling rapidly at night. The camp fire was a very welcome sight in the evenings. |
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| Stork Billed Kingfisher ; Green Bee Eater ; Changeable Hawk Eagle ; Shikra ; Brown Fish Owl |
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| The cold weather affected the tigers’ behaviour as well, and sightings were lower than normal for the first two weeks. During one period of seven drives there were almost no sightings for anyone over the whole park, and it was just as well that the group had sufficient time at Bandhavgarh to cope with this eventuality. Over the weeks the weather returned to normal, and by the end of the trip the midday temperatures were topping 40C. |
| The sad news was that the cub found in December and taken to Bhopal zoo had died after a couple of weeks. However, news came during the week that we arrived back in Bandhavgarh that Banbai had been sighted with three healthy cubs. It is possible that the fourth cub was too weak and that this had led to its abandonment. Mother and cubs were seen infrequently and my best sighting came one afternoon in March. We took a leisurely drive over to the east side of the park, and arrived at the Aama Nallah to be confronted by a large group of jeeps parked on the slope below. The tigers had been heard on one side of the track, and the jeeps had left a gap for the tigers to cross. Having arrived “late” we were not expecting to have a good view from the back, but waited in the hope that something would happen. Those at the front suddenly realised that the tigers were getting close to the track, and rather than wait for them to cross they impatiently dashed forward to try and get a better view right away. This closed the gap on the track and, not surprisingly, the tigers turned around and went back into the forest without anybody having any sighting at all. After a couple of minutes we realised that the tigers had walked up the slope towards us and were about to cross the track behind us. The back jeep now became the front, and we simply turned around in our seats and watched as mother and cubs walked across fifteen metres away. |
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| One of Banbai’s cubs from her April 2004 litter has now returned to the park, claiming part of the territory that she grew up in from her mother. Now bearing the name Mirchani, she has two cubs of her own who were born during the summer of 2007. The cubs were mature enough to be left on their own whilst their mother went about the business of hunting, and she had a particular meadow that she regularly used for this purpose. Many times we were able to watch the cubs waiting in the grass until their mother came to call them, and we had some good views as they crossed between the meadow and the forested hillside. |
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| The young male Chobana continues to float around the northern edge of Tala range, and we had a couple of good sightings of him, the best being early one morning. The tiger had already been glimpsed some way off in the forest. They have their preferred routes through the forest (including the man made tracks) and, knowing his direction and the layout of the terrain away from the road, we had a good idea where he would appear. Two jeeps from our group drove to the predicted spot and parked up either side of a bend in the track. Sure enough we heard a heavy rustling in the dry leaf litter that covered the forest floor, and the tiger stepped out right in front of us, passing between the jeeps. |
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| Chobana |
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| Chorbera, his mother, also continues to be regularly sighted along the northern edge of Tala Range. On one memorable occasion we had just begun to watch her from elephant when she decided to move and the rule is that the elephant tries to stay with the tiger until it settles, so that the next elephant knows where to take the tourists. We spent a full half hour meandering through the forest as Kutapan, our mahout, guided his elephant Ban Raj after the walking tigress. In terms of observing the tiger in its natural element, this is almost as good as it gets, though she would go one better before my stay in the park was finished. |
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| Jhurjura had been very elusive during my visit in November, owing to her having three new cubs to protect. We sometimes saw the family interacting around Rajbehra dam, the tigers a little more confident with the tourist jeeps having to watch from across the water. On one occasion Jhurjura took to the water for a swim. With the cubs now six months old, she was happy enough to leave them in the long grasses of the meadow. Good sightings were had in the early morning and late evening as the cubs came to meet their mother. When the air around Rajbehra is still it has a peculiar quality that seems to amplify sound, and the “aroom” of the mother calling her cubs in the gathering dusk is an unforgettable sound. |
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| Jhurjura & cub at Rajbehra dam |
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| The big surprise of the trip was Bandar. He is normally very difficult to see, but Chakradhara was now receptive to mating, and over a period of about four weeks the movements of the two became closely linked. My first sighting of them together came at the end of February between Siddh Baba and the main meadow. (This was the first time that I had seen them in the same place since my first visit to Bandhavgarh in January 2004). It seemed that Bandar was interested in mating and Chakradhara wasn’t. Then it seemed that she was interested and he wasn’t. I wonder if anybody knows the tiger equivalent of “Not tonight, I’ve got a headache”? One evening we watched as Bandar walked north from the meadow to Siddh Baba, stopping occasionally and looking behind to make sure that Chakradhara was following. Normally Chakradhara would not pass beyond the “Y” junction next to the meadow that marks the boundary of her territory but, distracted as she was, she followed Bandar all the way through Chorbera’s territory and up to the edge of Tala village. |
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| Bandar & Chakradhara together ; Chakradhara following Bandar ; Bhitri |
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| After about two weeks, we still had no evidence that mating had occurred. By now, the second of the regular tour groups had returned back to Delhi, and the chairman of Coca Cola and his wife had now joined me for a week on a bespoke “1 on 1” tour. We had arranged to spend a full five days on elephant, and this turned out to be one of the most amazing periods for sightings that I have spent in the park. |
| With the private hire of the elephant we were able to enter the park 15 minutes earlier than normal, which gave us chance to take a drive in the stillness of the pre dawn while our assigned elephant carried out some advance scouting. We then met up with Kutapan and Ban Raj to move into the forest. By 6.45 am we had already found our first tiger. This was Bhitri female, one of Chakradhara’s litter born in December 2004, and now establishing her own territory on the northern edge of the Tala Range. We watched her for a short while, but as a second elephant arrived she headed off up a slope that was too steep to follow. |
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| Bandar ; Chakradhara ; both tigers together post mating |
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| We walked through the forest for a while, heading toward Judwahni waterhole but taking a more direct route as we were on elephant. This was to be very revealing over the next five days as I finally got to see firsthand features of the landscape that I had only been able to visualise from maps, getting a better understanding of where the tigers actually go when they are away from the road and out of sight. Later we found ourselves on the far side of Chakradhara meadow, on the wooded slopes at the base of the fort hill, looking for Bandar and Chakradhara. We came across both tigers lying apart in the grass and waited to see what would happen. Slowly Chakradhara rose to her feet and arched her back, stretching, before walking across to the prone figure of Bandar. He stood, and the two tigers nuzzled together before he walked around to the rear of the female and mounted, holding her down by the back of the neck. As Bandar withdrew, Chakradhara turned and snarled, and the mating proper had finally started after weeks of courtship. We waited on the motionless elephant, and after 15 minutes the tigers mated once more, before moving away through the grass. This would continue with similar frequency for several days, and we slowly turned around and moved in the opposite direction so as not to disturb them. |
| Chorbera was also part of the experience and we spent several sessions watching the tigress. For three sessions we watched as she showed us how expert she was at lying in the grass and relaxing, and as we watched her behaviour we realised how close the resemblance was to domestic cats. This was particularly so when she rolled onto her back with all four legs in the air, showing a scene all too familiar from my own cats back home. On the fourth session she rewarded our patience. The morning started on steep slopes of the hills near Siddh Baba, where Chorbera was resting on a ledge. After a difficult climb Ban Raj carried us to a position level with the tigress. She duly posed as we took some photographs, before moving down onto the grassland near the shrine. |
| For some 45 minutes we followed her as she meandered through the grass, occasionally resting, before heading back towards the slopes that she had left earlier. As she entered the tree line, a herd of chital caught her eye, and she immediately began to stalk. We sat there quietly as the gap between hunter and prey gradually narrowed, the deer completely oblivious to the tiger’s presence. At the last minute one of the deer realised the threat, and the herd fled. Almost immediately, Chorbera turned her attention to a small group of sambar further up the hill, and began to close on them. After a short while, it became obvious to the tiger that she could not get in a position to ambush, and so abandoned the stalk, resuming her normal walk through the forest. |
| However, all was not lost. She suddenly became aware that one of the chital had become separated from the first group she had been interested in (we think that it my have been injured in some way) and there was an instant reaction from the big cat. A walk became a trot, and as she realised that the deer was not reacting to her approach the trot became a full blown charge. Chorbera hit the deer about 150 metres in front if us behind a fallen tree, and locked her powerful jaws around the throat to suffocate it. After a short pause she carried the carcass up the slope and into the trees, and we left her to enjoy her meal. |
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| Chorbera resting on a ledge, before moving through the meadow and making a kill |
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| That same afternoon, which was also our last on the elephant, proved that the tigers can be as interesting to watch when they are at rest as when they are moving about in the forest. At the edge of Chakradhara meadow the forested slopes begin to rise quickly up to the sheer cliffs of the fort, and hidden among the trees are several man made caves that date back hundreds of years. Tigers find these caves quite useful for shelter, and so we decided to check a few out to see if any were in residence. In the second set of caves that we checked, we found a very sleepy Bandar, who put his head up to look at us and then promptly went back to sleep. We watched him for an hour and a half as he slept, the warm afternoon sun slowly moving the shadows across the walls of the west facing caves. At one point, he lay there clearly dreaming with eyes open, tongue sticking out and front paws twitching. Finally, as the light began to fade and the temperature fall, Bandar slowly got to his feet and walked out of the cave entrance. He moved a few metres along the hillside and then sat down in front of us, allowing us to get some photographs in the few minutes that we had left. |
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| Bandar in a manmade cave, late in the afternoon |
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| On the 31st March I arrived back in Tala with the next tour group to hear some distressing news. Earlier that morning, a jeep had seen a large male tiger carrying the body of a dead cub along a forest track near to the border between Tala and Khitauli Ranges. The nearby villagers had heard noises of tigers fighting throughout the night, which must have been Mahaman trying to defend her cubs. Fearing for the safety of the other three cubs, the forest department closed that area of the park and began a search. No trace of either cubs or mother was found. This was still the case by the time I left Bandhavgarh on 10th April and we presumed that all of the cubs had been killed in the attack. |
| Some pictures were taken of the male tiger, and my friend Duyshant Singh confirmed that the tiger was not from the Tala range, and in all probability was an outsider that had come from Khitauli range. At less than a year old, the cubs would have been neither an immediate threat nor a match for the male. The likelihood is that the male acted to remove future rivals and with a view to furthering his own genes, since the result of removing dependant cubs from a female is to bring her into oestrus. |
| The story does, however, have a better ending. After I had been home for a few weeks, I received an email from Santosh Saligram, a fellow “tiger fan” from India, who had been in Bandhavgarh at the end of April. A member of his group saw and photographed three cubs on the forest tracks on the 28th. I had this confirmed by Jai Dev Singh (one of my team of naturalists when I visit the park) so Mahaman’s spirited defence of her remaining cubs had been successful. Jai added that, due to the scarcity of water in her home territory, Mahaman was spending more time in the Khitauli Range. This would have been one of the reasons why she had not been seen, as tourists do not visit that range. |
| Regrettably, another perennial problem appeared during May. Whilst the villagers are not supposed to venture into the park on foot, the temptation is too great to resist and they continue to do so. On one such visit to collect firewood a villager came across Mirchani’s male cub. Although not fully grown, at twelve months old he is still a formidable animal compared to a human, and unfortunately the villager was killed. The Forest Department have announced compensation of Rs 100,000 (approximately £1,175) for the family, and we hope that no retaliation will be taken against the tiger. |
| The villager who was attacked by the sloth bear has finally had the first (of many) operations to rebuild his face. Initial signs are good, and if I hear any news during the summer I’ll let you know. Rosie the dog is in good health, and she was treated to her end of season bath before we left. |
| Throughout the season, the elephants had been a source of enjoyment, in particular the baby elephant who is now becoming very mischievous at bathing time. The place where the elephants are bathed has part of the stream blocked by a makeshift dam built from sandbags. One afternoon he decided that he didn’t approve and proceeded to demolish the dam, releasing a mini tidal surge down the stream. |
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| Baby elephant testing his strength & adult elephant bathing |
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| We had all been amazed at how many times we had seen Bandar during the preceding weeks, and he still did not disappoint us even at the end. I had two superb sightings of him with the last group. For the first of these, we had seen Bandar walking one of his regular routes during the morning, though some distance away. We knew that he had gone to rest in a cave at Ghoradamon, so we returned there in the afternoon. The cave is tucked under an overhang in a short steep gorge above a waterhole, and from the road the cave cannot be seen – was he still there? There were a lot of jeeps spread about, but past experience told us that when Bandar was on this particular route he usually comes out of the gorge at a specific spot. We chose our vantage point accordingly and eventually we were rewarded by Bandar appearing over the lip of the gorge right where we had predicted, and walking right past the front of our jeep. The final sighting was very early one morning, ten minutes after we had driven into the park. We found Bandar lying by the side of the road just past the left hand fork of the main meadow. He slowly eased himself upright, and walked through the grass with the rising sun behind him before crossing the road and moving out of view. As our jeep had the windscreen latched down for an easier view I just sat on the bonnet and photographed him as he walked by. A great way to finish the season. |
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| Bandar emerging from Ghoradamon & early morning in the meadow |
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| The three groups that came to the park in the autumn had between 11 and 14 sightings. The five groups that came to the park in the spring had between 9 and 24 sightings. Though the composition of the population changes, the confirmed number of tigers in the Tala Range stands at 24, with another 4 occasionally seen on the periphery. |
| Bye for now ! |
| Pete |
| 3 July 2008 |
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