It is impossible to complete a world tour checklist without visiting two places. The first is the world’s largest democracy, India, and the second is the African Bush. Surprisingly, both places share a common attraction: The Big Five. The term was first coined in the recreational hunting grounds of Africa. It refers to the five most difficult species to hunt on foot and includes the African Elephant, Cape Buffalo, Rhinoceros, African Lion, and African Leopard. Presently, the term is synonymous with wildlife tourism. These charismatic megafauna manage to attract millions of people from countries across the world. While visiting the African bush remains an elusive dream for many Indians, most don’t realize that we have our very own Big Five. They are the Indian Leopard, the Asiatic Lion, the Bengal Tiger, the Greater One Horned Rhino, and the Asiatic Elephant.
Common Leopard
The Indian Leopard, with a population of approximately 12,000 individuals, is probably the most successful feline species found in the world. The range of the Indian Leopard spreads across the subcontinent. This can be attributed to its versatile nature, which allows the species to survive in a variety of habitats, including grasslands, rainforests, higher altitudes, and mangroves. A flexible diet and superb camouflage allows the species to thrive even in the most degraded of habitats. In fact, leopards are also known to thrive near human habitation. One such example of this is the Sanjay Gandhi National Park. Housing over 30 leopards, the park is located in suburban Mumbai. It is not uncommon for leopards to venture into residential colonies at night.
The southern greens also possess a high density of leopards. In particular, Nagarhole National Park near the city of Mysore has proven to be a hotspot.
In parks with high tiger density, leopards tend to be far more elusive and disperse towards the outer regions of forests. This is an attempt to avoid interactions with tigers, the apex predator of India’s forests. Despite possessing a decent population of leopards, spotting a leopard in the heartland of the tiger’s range, such as Bandhavgarh, Pench and Tadoba is uncommon. The outer regions of the Protected Areas are rarely explored due to lower chances of tiger sightings.
The most famous leopard of Nagarhole is the resident male Black Panther.
Asiatic Lion
One of the most remarkable conservation successes is that of the Asiatic Lion. The species was widespread across the Middle East and the Indian Subcontinent. However, excessive hunting caused the population to plummet below 50 individuals, restricted to the Gir National Park of Gujarat. Now, there are over 600 individuals, dispersed far beyond the reaches of Gir. The unprecedented range expansion is a wonderful example of harmonious coexistence between human and beast. In fact, despite a high incidence of livestock depredation, their reverence in local communities remains to the highest degree.
The Asiatic Lion is vastly different from their larger African counterparts. Prides are significantly smaller, rarely more than 3-4 females and their cubs. Males are predominantly solitary, occasionally forming coalitions with other related males. The mane of the Gir lions are much shorter and darker than those found in Africa.
In recent times, there has been much controversy regarding the conservation of Gir Lions. There only remains one intact wild population. Not only does this encourage inbreeding depression but exposes the species to greater risk of extinction due to unprecedented disasters. Efforts have been made for decades to translocate a few lions from Gir and captivity to Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh. However, the state government of Gujarat does not want to lose its “pride”. These political gimmicks continue despite recent outbreaks of the highly contagious Canine Distemper Virus which has killed a large population of lions. One can only hope that science prevails over greed and selfishness.
Bengal Tiger
The Big Five remains incomplete without the largest feline species in the world, the Bengal Tiger. The species was classified as India’s National Animal in 1973 to redirect efforts to revive its dwindling population. A conservation project, named “Project Tiger” was launched around the same time and has met with much success. In the last couple of decades, the population of wild Bengal Tigers has nearly doubled. However, the success of “Project Tiger” is not limited to the revival of the population of this majestic feline. The increased number of designated wildlife areas, increased surveillance, and the development of the tiger safari industry had knock on effects on numerous other species. Like the wolves of Yellowstone National Park, the re-emergence of tigers in their ancient ranges has had top down effects on the ecosystem.
Currently, Karnataka has the highest population of wild tigers, followed closely by Madhya Pradesh. However, sightings are more challenging in the former state due to dense and mostly inaccessible rainforest. Due to its more open terrain, tiger sightings are better in the National Parks of Madhya Pradesh, such as Bandhvgarh and Kanha National Park. Going on safari between March and June increases sighting chances manifold. During the scorching summer afternoons, tigers tend to be found cooling off at the few remaining waterholes.
Tiger sightings are also decent in parks such as Ranthambore, Jim Corbett and Kaziranga. While the smaller and less famous sanctuaries also hold sizable populations, sightings here are not as common. Few of India’s most popular tigers never fail to attract large crowds to their respective parks!
Greater One Horned Rhino
The largest of the three rhino species found in India, the Greater One Horned Rhino has to be India’s most majestic and prehistoric terrestrial mammal. Like most other of the nation’s charismatic megafauna, the Indian Rhino also witnessed a miraculous comeback from the brink of extinction.
The alluvial grasslands of Kaziranga hosts 80% of India’s 3,000 rhinos. Conservational efforts, such as reintroduction, have been met with varying success in parks such as Dudhwa, Manas, Buxa and Probitora. Historically, the range of the Indian rhino would stretch beyond the floodplains of the Ganges and Punjab into Pakistan. The critically endangered Javan and Sumatran Rhinos were once found across the Brahmaputra floodplains. Currently, there are only occasional, unconfirmed reports of Javan Rhinos venturing into Manipur from Myanmar.
Unfortunately, rhinos across Asia still continue to be subject to gruesome poaching for their horns. In the black market, a rhino horn is worth up to 50 lakh rupees. It is no wonder that poaching syndicates are highly militarized. In fact, it is not infrequent for forest rangers in Kaziranga to be murdered by rhino poachers.
Despite a growing rhino population in India, poaching rates remain high. The international borders in North East India are generally porus and challenging to patrol due to the dense vegetation. This allows poachers to smuggle wildlife products out of India, often into China, via Bhutan, Nepal and Myanmar.
Asiatic Elephants
The Asiatic Elephant is the second largest terrestrial mammals in the world, second only to their African counterparts. There are less than 50,000 gentle giants left in Asia, out of which nearly 60% are found in India. While elephants historically could be found across the subcontinent, they are now only restricted to the Western Ghats, North East India and the Eastern states of Jharkhand, Bengal, Chattisgarh. Madhya Pradesh and Uttharakhand also witness intense elephant migration from neighbouring regions. Karnataka has the highest population of Asiatic Elephants, followed by Assam with 6,050 and 5,720 individuals respectively. Given the tropical and moist habitat of the Western Ghats, it is no surprise that South India accounts for 45% of the population.
Other than size, Asiatic Elephants vary significantly from their African counterparts. In Asia, only males have tusks. Contrastingly, in Africa, both sexes possess horns. The semi-circular shaped ears of the Asiatic elephant are noticeably smaller than the fan shaped ears of elephants found in Africa. There are two separate species of African elephants. These are the Forest and Savanna Elephants, both of which are spiraling into extinction. There remains only one species of elephant found across Asia. The Asiatic elephant, however, consists of three subspecies. These are the Indian, Sri Lankan and Sumatran Elephants. Despite their differences, all three species of elephants are crucial ecosystem engineers.
The best place to spot these Gentle Giants is Nagarhole National Park. During the summer months, the park’s backwaters attract huge congregations of elephants, which migrate from all parts of South India in search of water.
Other parks in the South are also wonderful for elephant sighting, including Bhadra Tiger Reserve and B.R Hills. Kaziranga and Jim Corbett National Parks both have healthy populations of elephants and sightings are common.
Though populations are increasing in significantly in some states such as Uttharakhand and Karnataka, the future of the Indian Elephant is concerning. With rampant development, habitat fragmentation is prevalent across the elephant’s range, particularly in the Western Ghats. Given the species high dependency on migration, this fragmentation has resulted in massive conflict with humans. Annually, 100 people and 50 elephants are killed in conflict. Crop damage, both by trampling and consumption by elephants, causes severe economic losses for India’s poor farmers, particularly Paddy and Sugarcane farmers. Given the growth of paddy fields in the dry season, when natural food resources are depleted, elephants are likely to resort to crop raiding, leading to conflict. Innovative solutions, such as artificial beehives, can prove to be a gamechanger in tackling human elephant conflict. Enterprises utilizing the many benefits of elephant dung will also incentivize the conservation of these gentle giants.
On the other hand, the appearance of roads and mines seems to trigger fear amongst matriarchal elephants. This leads to the avoidance of infrastructure projects in their migratory routes. An example of this is the migration of elephants from Chattisgarh to Bandhavgarh National Park in Madhya Pradesh, following the expansion of illegal mines.
India also has about 2,000 captive elephants. The majority of these elephants are in the custody of private owners. The mistreatment of captive elephants is rampant. From torturing as a part of the taming process, to a lack of food, shelter and hygienic conditions to being exploited commercially, captive elephants undergo immense physical and mental trauma. Fortunately, significant effort is being made to rescue and rehabilitate these elephants. However, the release of these elephants back into the wild still seems impractical.
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