“It was around eight in the night when my brother-in-law and I sat down with a cup of tea,” began Loganathan, the caretaker of an estate in Valparai, in the Anaimalai Hills of Tamil Nadu. “We were discussing some work, and the women were inside, listening to the radio. Suddenly, a sambar jumped into the front yard, just a few metres from us, and sprang away into the bushes. Before we could comprehend what was happening, a huge tiger landed in the same place. We froze!”
Loganathan is a member of the Kadar tribe that is native to these hills. He manages a 175-acre estate-cum-conservation project, where the native rainforest is being painstakingly regenerated through mindful practices that conserve biodiversity. He is also a masterful storyteller.
“It was an unexpected encounter for the tiger as well,” Loganathan continued, as the audience hung onto his every word. “Giving us a brief stare that sent chills down our spines, it disappeared into the bushes, in pursuit of the sambar, leaving us sweating on a cold, winter night.”
Loganathan has plenty of stories like this, because he has lived in these forests all his life. His family resides here, and are entirely dependent on the forest ecosystem for their livelihood. Their understanding of this landscape runs deep, and their traditional knowledge of the local flora and fauna is both vast and old. This is why, as part of nature walks and rainforest expeditions in the Valparai region, my ecotourism company includes an interactive session with the Kadars.
Cover photo: Gaurav Ramnarayanan
The Valparai plateau is located at the southern end of the Western Ghats. The region was once blanketed in contiguous forests, but the landscape has changed considerably since colonial times. Large parts of the region’s dense, evergreen forests have been replaced with commercial plantations, and today, the landscape is dominated by monocultured tea estates, with scattered plantations of pepper, coffee, cardamom, and cinnamon.
Still, wildlife survives on the 220-sq-km Valparai plateau, thanks to several patches of native rainforest around it, and its proximity to protected forests ranges such as Top Slip, Parambikulam, Vazhachal, Manomboly, and Eravikulam. Thanks to its unique geographical location and favourable climate, a rich diversity of species abound. Wild prey such as sambar, Indian gaur, wild boar, Indian muntjac, and Indian spotted chevrotain, are all present and support carnivores including sloth bear, gaur, wild dog, even tigers (that require vast space and a good prey base). But none is as contentious as the leopard, whose diet flexibility has enabled it to thrive in a variety of ecological settings. It adapts its preferences and hunting techniques to match available prey native to the region. When prey becomes scarce, leopards in these parts catch rodents and feed on the carcass of dead animals, sometimes even hunting langurs and lion-tailed macaques.
Understandably, there have been instances of human-animal encounters, some positive and some negative, with losses on both sides. Between the years 2000 and 2010, there were approximately 45 incidents of livestock depredation in the Valparai plateau, leading to injury of 3 cows and the death of 51 livestock. Over the same 11-year period, there were leopard attacks on 15 people, which resulted in injuries and deaths. There were losses on the leopard side as well: In the aftermath of these incidents, and due to triggered public pressure, the forest department even captured and translocated a few leopards out of the region.
Like most stories of conservation, the reality is not black and white. There exists the world of the Kadar family, filled with magical stories of wildlife encounters, where no harm was caused to either species. But there are also stories of labourers who have migrated here in search of job opportunities. Most have little understanding of these forests and the way of life here, and often find themselves in unfamiliar territory. The wisdom of the jungle was not imparted to them during their upbringing, unlike in the case of the Kadars, and this puts them at risk of misinterpreting animal behaviour. This is where awareness drives and workshops come in. If new residents had access to informative sessions about the local habitat, animal movements, etc., the entire community might benefit from it.
Media coverage is another factor. Though there are frequent instances of estate workers and locals enjoying leopard sightings from a distance, incidents only get reported when cattle is lifted, or personal loss occurs. In reality, such instances generally happen in areas with poorly managed garbage and open decomposing meat waste, which attracts dogs and pigs — easy prey for a leopard.
Thankfully, the community has rallied together. In recent years, better garbage disposal has helped reduce conflict tremendously, and for a stretch of five years between 2012 and 2017, no human deaths were caused by leopards in the Valparai plateau. This is also the period when the forest department, Nature Conservation Foundation, local media, and managers from local estates came together to spread awareness about the local ecosystem in general, and leopards in particular, using local cable networks and direct meetings.
As it happened, I frequented Valparai during this period, mostly in search of birds, though I longed to catch proper sight of a big cat as well. On one particular day, it had been drizzling from the afternoon, and I had given up hope of sighting anything, including birds. We were driving through a tea estate when we came to a junction which was blocked by a tractor collecting the harvest of the day. As a result we took a detour, and just as the jeep turned a bend, there it was — a huge, male leopard, lying right on the path!
He was only 50 metres from the collection area where estate labourers were loading the day’s harvest onto the tractor, just chilling out in the open. He seemed to be so comfortable and relaxed, unperturbed by the chattering or human activity close by. Since we spotted him from a distance, and maintained a comfortable space, he didn’t seem to mind our jeep either.
A few minutes later, an estate worker walked along the path, towards the leopard, completely unaware of its presence. We watched as the leopard got up, almost reluctantly, left his comfortable spot and walked into the bushes. The worker continued walking, oblivious to the feline presence, and a potential conflict was avoided just like that.
We drove a little further still able to spot him from afar, lying among the tea bushes. He had accepted our presence by then, and the next half hour is something I will cherish for a long time. We watched the leopard laze, even as a grey jungle fowl ventured near him. It was as if the fowl knew he was not in a mood to hunt that day. Soon, a stripe-necked mongoose scurried onto the scene. When it realised the leopard’s presence, it instantly disappeared into the bushes, filling the scene with its loud alarm call. As dusk approached, the leopard yawned, napped, rolled on the grass, and spray marked his territory, before finally walking away. But before he disappeared from our sight, he turned back one last time, and gave us a stare that made me freeze.
Every once in a while, when you’re out in the wild (or adjoining areas like this tea estate), you get to experience an event like this. They are moments that linger long enough to assuage any doubts that they happened. The mainstream media frequently carries stories of the conflict between man and animal, for resources and space. These are real and true. But there are also experiences like this, that make me hopeful for a future where farms and forests, wildlife and people, science and wonder, can all coexist.
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