In the tiger's footsteps...

I took this picture on a brief but exciting walk to visit a waterhole in the forest near Tadoba-Andhari TR. The water body was created by the SF team with the participation of local villagers.

Water conservation projects are high on the activity list of all our field officers. Click here to see some waterholes and stop dams built under our programmes.

Two friends accompanied Bipasha and me, so including our Conservation Officer Bandu Kumare we were a group of five. Bandu used to be a park guide earlier so he knows a lot about wildlife and the forest.

On all my trips to Tadoba I've looked at the forest from the road and wondered what it's like in there, among the teak trees and bamboo clumps. What does it look like to a bear or chital living inside?

Now I know! It's dense and paper-dry and pale yellow at this season, and visibility isn't very high so as a human you really wouldn't know what might come out from behind the next bamboo thicket. (Other mammals wouldn't always be so handicapped, since they have far better senses of smell and hearing than we do!) Bandu pointed to a gaur that he glimpsed through the vegetation and we saw three chital bounding away, startled by our arrival. Inquiries about what animals had deposited some of the scats lying around brought forth the answers "bear" and "tiger" (pronounced by Bandu in a cheerful matter-of-fact tone, with varying reactions from our group).

So we know that all these animals use these forests and benefit from the waterhole. The site is regularly visited by the Forest Department so it does get monitored. You can see their machan (platform, for want of a better word) up in the tree behind the waterhole. It's a good feeling that we are providing a much-needed drinking spot for the fauna here. Anyone who has visited the Vidarbha region in May would understand the relief the water must be bringing to the animals of this parched place. The water level in the hole has sunk but is still accessible.

There isn't any real danger to people walking in a group in the middle of the day, but all the same none of us really wanted to encounter a bear or tiger or gaur on foot. And neither did we want to disturb the animals by intruding in their space. So after a few minutes we walked back to the road.

I think for all of us that walk will remain one of the most memorable experiences of this wonderful trip.

Photo: Rajashree Khalap
Tadoba-Andhari area