Conservation: It's Pay Back Time

Our  Earth: A Saga of Exploitation

Not only extensive farming, poaching, wood logging, and hunting have denuded our wilds we conveniently seek to forgive our sins whence it comes to breakneck industrial revolution and urbanization. Like agriculture, large industries and industrial estates scrap off nature from Earth in long strips along with associated urbanization in our towns and cities. 

In the past few centuries, we have hastened the demise of many invaluable ecosystems to alternate them with nonviable human constructs and the process goes on. The developed countries have been quick to extensively exploit natural resources and strip off ecosystems forests, grasslands, and rivers to name a few in order to develop in material terms without digging deep into ramifications. Most countries are stripped of natural lands and they have virtually exterminated their wilderness. But there is no looking back,  and if there is at places it is weak and without commitment. As a consequence, we are facing climate change and species extinction due to the dismembering of remaining ecosystems, pollution, human intrusions, and alternating natural systems to suit our exigencies.             

Earth is supposed to be shared among trillions of life forms thus maintaining an equilibrium so that life sustenance mechanism remains inviolate. Large chunks of ecosystems have been decimated for crops without any circumspection, and industrialization, and urbanization is taking place with haste. We are turning settlements into cement jungles and urban ghettos. 

All we look at is modern infrastructure and the gleaming societies and lifestyles they generate forgetting the dead that lies beneath. The industrial revolution has been a major disaster and caused wars innumerable, social disparities as well as grave harm to the environment. Global warming is an evident phenomenon among even those who are not erudite or aware, and the suffering is taking a toll in terms of health physical and mental.   

It is difficult to hinder this blitzkrieg because dispensations do not bow down and at the most pay lip service to conservation. Maintaining an equilibrium would require some committed steps for preservation even if the infrastructure buildup is halted. We simply cannot regenerate the complex living systems that nature does. This is rabid development is the trend everywhere, and most vicious in overpopulated countries trying to emerge from ongoing poverty without understanding the route they are adopting. As urban ghettos increase poverty will as well for we see life not as sustainable but gauge impoverished societies keeping the yardstick of measure highlighting disparity with those well developed (sic). There is no limit to the demands of humanity, and we will perish if we fulfill them at the cost of nature. Are we going to need artificial glass bubbles with oxygen supplies to survive on Earth in the future?       

To keep industries alive and the economy booming we continue to exploit natural resources which are already dwindling. In economic haste, we are not using the resources in a judicious manner, and are not at all looking for renewable on a war footing. Development is the mantra of disaster and the infrastructure built up in hinterlands in countries like India is a scourge with no mitigation seemingly possible. Rather than judging the economy by scale, we must peep into the environmental disaster we are leaving in the wake. We need to define our basic needs and stick to them.         

Poverty alleviation should not come about through the industrial revolution, it should come by rational use of renewable energy and a paradigm shift in our lifestyles. Too much energy consumption or unprecedented use of natural resources has wreaked havoc on our planet and we need to stem the rot. The major stress factor is not poverty but our excessive consumption of fossil fuels and other natural resources. Controlling the population is wise but there is no such urgency among various countries and demographics. Population control should be imperative, especially in Asia and Africa.         

Time to Pay Back 

We need reforestation, conservation of wildlife, habitat repair, and preservation of the ecosystem that supports them, and to stop the destruction of tropical forests going on on large scale.  We will have to redefine our lifestyle and consumption pattern and wean out what is unsustainable with vigor and commitment.     

We will have to have a methodology in place as far as industrialization and infrastructure build-up is taking place. We will have to draw out sustainable plans and practices which mitigate damage to natural lands.  Yes a lot more has to be done in order to preserve our  Earth and the efforts should come about not only from institutions but we the public as well.  

We can do it, we are successfully saving the tiger and the lion and many other endangered species and India has also preserved good enough ecosystems. There is hope! 

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Uday Works as Freelance Naturalist and Blogs on conservation, tigers, environmental issues.

He also provides SEO and Website Contents in English.

He can be contacted at:

Mail: pateluday90@hotmail.com

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The Day of The Jackal

The animal turned and twisted like an acrobat throwing its whole body into spirals driven by fear of death. I pressed on my breaks, hard, and a life was saved. There were fast moving cars zipping past me at breakneck speed the jackal would had been killed instantly. But the animal was wise and chose to face a slower moving car in that moment of erred action which proves suicidal for so many wild species. 

Death of wild animals on Indian roads is a common phenomena, and hardly any body pays attention to this menace. Jackals, snakes, rabbits, foxes, deer, leopard, tigers, elephant, and more are regular victims of our transportation systems.   

Well it was a good day for me. Hey man do not go nuts it was only a jackal.

Bisons of Kanha

Bos Gaurus
The coarse grazer belonging to Family Bovidae is one of the most impressive mammals of Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh. The animal is found widespread in intact forest habitats where interference of man is minimal. Like the tiger bison or gaur as it is called in Hindi cannot tolerate human interference and usually becomes locally extinct due to disease carried by livestock of the settlers. Competition for food is another factor in the species loosing ground.   

This did not happen in Kanha, thanks to large area and mountainous region that gave these animals enough space. The Barasingha suffered the most with extensive loss of habitat. The bison is a local migratory animal and sticks to its forests in vicinity. 

The bisons are less seen during the winters in the plains and meadows of Kanha. The coarse grazers get enough to forage on the  table top mountains and are content to stay there in the dense confines. But as water levels decreases with passing off of winter, and leaf shedding begins these animals start migrating to lower areas. Herds can be seen in forest confines and the grassy meadows during the early morning hours and late evenings as the heat increases.   

They are sighted from February in larger numbers. The animal is a gregarious species which live in small heards to larger herds of 40 to 50 heads. The matriarchal system prevails with dominant males keeping to the fringes or away from the herd in non breeding period.  The herd consists of  young females, males and fawns. 

In winters mating occurs on hillside and the fawn are born during May onwards. The dominant males often engage in a tussle and various display of aggression before courtship to take control of the herd with female in estrous. 

The population increased substantially after trans location of villages in the core zone. The species suffered extensive loss after my visit in 1976. This was due to foot and mouth disease or rinderpest and many animals died during the prevalence. In recent times gaur can be seen in Kisli Range as well as in the buffer zone around Indri Camp. Herds now cross over at the road to Mukki near the villages in the periphery. These animals are always susceptible to disease prevalence among the live stock there.     

The conservation efforts as whole has paid of  for this species. The increasing number would need new grounds for  the gaur and these would be the buffer. The forest canopy is not dense here and the region  is open to man animal conflict.