Starting from January 22, thousands of feet will patter through the dirt trails of Telangana forests in search of the most elusive beast, the king of the jungles, the tiger.
For many, the Tiger Census carried out simultaneously across the country once in four years, is about counting pug marks, and collecting scat for DNA analysis. Few are aware that the big cats coming under the lens are not only striped, but spotted!
Yes, panther too is an integral part of the Tiger Census, but often shadowed by its scarcer cousin. Not just panther, but all the big carnivores, most kinds of herbivores, cattle, trees and shrubs, and even human presence in the jungles would be listed between January 22 and 29, as part of the Tiger Census.
Barring two holidays, the six days are equally divided between trailing the carnivores and scouting for the herbivores, and taking stock of the green stock every now and then. The enthusiasts and novices from urban jungles, volunteering in the naive hope of being able to sight the big cat, are in for some hard work! The work is divided into 3,000 forest beats across the State. Teams, comprising two to three members per beat, would look for signs of carnivore presence, not just scat and pugmarks, but urine scent, roars, and even scratches left on tree barks. Each day, they would have to walk a minimum of five kilometres, with particular focus on dirt roads, trails, footpaths, river beds and nullahs—the usual haunts of tiger.
The GPS coordinate of the beginning point of each search path should be recorded, and within all the protected areas and territorial forests where GPS units are available, the coordinates need to be recorded every 20 minutes.
If any trail of pugmarks is sighted, one should stop and determine the animal that had passed by. One cannot afford to get confused between a tiger cub and a panther, as a cub would invariably be accompanied by its mother. Also to be recorded are wild dogs, bears, jackals, jungle cats, among others. Plaster of Paris casts are to be taken of tiger’s footprints.
Outside the forest trail, information should be extracted from villagers about the carnivores they have sighted, with or without cubs, about any livestock kill, and others.
The next three days would be spent looking for ungulates, which include animals such as chital, sambar, chowsinga, blackbuck, nilgai, gaur, chinkara, wild boar, langur, peacock, hare, and even livestock.
The linear distance of two kilometres to be covered during the search for ungulates is known as ‘Transect Line’, and needs to be traversed in absolute silence starting from 6 a.m. Details of herbivore droppings are as important as tiger scats.
“A new feature included this time is the recording of angular sighting, requiring a volunteer to record the distance and angle of the animal from where he or she is standing,” said A. Sankaran, the OSD (Wild Life), who conducted a training session for the Tiger Census volunteers on Saturday.
The kit provided to the volunteers includes a compass to measure the angle, and also two rope lengths to mark the circles within which the vegetation and the habitat type would be noted down.
“Earlier, the one taking the census would be required to note down only five tree and shrub species that he/she had noticed. Now, it has been increased to 10,” he said. Stopping every 400 metres, the volunteer, assisted of course by the forest staff, would need to survey the surroundings and jot down not just the details of trees, but of any human disturbance within 15-metre radius. Cutting of trees, lopped branches, cattle browsing, permanent settlements, snares, all amount to the signs of human presence. Information about non-timber forest produce collected from the forest, and about forest fire occurrences, and even of leaf litter beneath the trees are to be recorded.
So far, 120 volunteers, young and old, have expressed interest in taking part in the Tiger Census, the officials informed.
“We are looking for more volunteers. Being literate is enough for this. The formats are kept simple so that even a beat guard should be able to fill them up,” says P. Raghuveer, the PCCF rank officer monitoring the exercise. Those looking to enrol may contact Mr. Sankaran on 9494019595.
