March 2017 Archives - The Green Ogre

What happens you wake up a sleeping tiger? We found out a few months ago when we were in one of South India’s protected areas.

We were there to be a part of a camera trapping exercise. As we walked through the shrub forest in the hot, late morning sun, we found plenty of tiger activity (scrapes, scat etc.). After walking for about 30 minutes we reached the site of the traps and proceeded to download the photos and change the batteries as required.

Once this was done, we rested for a while near the stream. When the time came to start our way back, I opined that we should take the longer route hugging the stream as there would be sufficient tree cover to protect us from the harsh afternoon heat. Since everybody was in agreement we proceeded at a rather slow pace, trying as much as possible not to crush dry leaves that carpeted the forest floor. Our friend Shanmugam, along with an NGO member, walked ahead while Ananth, Karthik and I, along with the second NGO member, brought up the rear. However careful we were, we still managed to scare off a fish eagle that was perched on a low branch. We had no clue of its presence until it swooshed out of the tree into the open sky over the stream. The same happened with a Brown Fish owl, a monitor lizard and a snake — all of which spotted us first and made good their escape.

Frustrated at being spotted first and not being able to get a good look or photograph, we kept moving ahead. Suddenly one of the two members of the NGO, who was walking along with the three of us, told us to stop urgently in a very low tone. As I almost bumped into him, he whispered, “Tiger! Tiger!”

I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. I scanned the opposite bank of the stream for the cat. I saw the two people ahead of us take cover behind a forked tree and peep ahead. When I couldn’t find the striped form anywhere on the opposite bank, I asked him where the tiger was, to which he replied “Here, on this side!” I froze as his words entered my ears and made sense. Lying on a rock about 20-25 feet straight ahead of me, on our side of the stream, was a large striped body!

The sleeping tiger lay about 20-25 feet from us — The tiger lay about 20-25 feet from us, napping among the rocks

I felt a cold tingle run down my spine from the neck all the way to the feet. For a second I couldn’t move and then, to make sure I wouldn’t make a sound, I slipped my feet out of my sandals and placed them carefully on the sandy soil of the bank. Luckily for us, the sleeping tiger was lying horizontal to us, its head facing the other way. However, if it turned its head, we would be in full view as we did not have any cover unlike the two people hiding behind the forked tree. We had nothing to do but stay petrified and keep our eyes on the tiger.

The sleeping tiger on the river bed — The sleepy tiger

After a full minute or two, I decided to move slowly, barefoot, over to the root of a tree and crouch down. From here I had a clear view of the sleeping tiger as I raised my camera to take a couple of shots. Looking through the viewfinder I was about to take my second shot when the tiger lifted its head. The only reason I didn’t wet my pants was because I was already dehydrated from the walk in the hot sun. Luckily, the dazed tiger went back to sleep again. Now that I realized that the tiger was indeed very sleepy, my stupid trophy-crazy self took control. I got up and started slowly and stealthily making my way towards the forked tree from where I could take a better shot. During this time, Karthik took my spot on the root and was taking a couple of shots when the tiger suddenly whipped its ahead around to find us. As Karthik froze, the tiger’s expression changed from sleepy to one of surprise or shock. Time stood still as everybody braced for the uncertain next second. Luckily for us, the next second saw the tiger leap off the rock and bound over the embankment into the shrub forest.

The sleeping tiger woke up and looked surprised (Photo copyright: Ananth Raj) — The surprised Tiger (Photo copyright: Ananth Raj)

After a few speechless moments trying to digest the last few minutes and with wide grins on our faces, we started talking about what had just happened. As we were talking we heard an alarm call by a deer quite a distance away – the spooked tiger seemed to be moving further away towards a hillock. We then moved to inspect the spot where the sleeping tiger had lain. We found the pug marks that it had made in the soft mud as it bounded away. Moving ahead and within 20-30 feet of where the tiger was sleeping, we found the fetid carcass of a partially eaten gaur. The tiger had feasted on its kill earlier and was resting under the trees when we chanced upon it.

On our way back, we began debating whether the sleeping tiger had heard one of us move or not. I am of the opinion that the tiger smelled us as we were upwind to it. Whatever be the case, those few minutes from when we spotted the sleeping tiger to us being spotted by it, were some of the most exhilarating moments of my life!

Text & Photos – Arun Menon

Lead image: Ananth Raj

Posted from Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.

Ahead on the sunlight-dappled road, an obstruction stirs on the macadam. Framed in a peachy-pink canopy of trees in riotous bloom, it’s a large monkey, its sickle-curved tail held aloft like a pennant. The animal crouches, then turns its coal-black face towards me as I slow down the car. It does not budge at the vehicle’s approach. Not one bit. It’s a female Tufted Gray Langur, cradling in her arms a younger version of herself. She is sitting on a veritable carpet of fallen Gliricidia flowers.

In Horsley Hills, the brief subcontinental springtime is in its final throes. At nearly seven in the morning, the sun is strong and angular, pouring molten gold on the treetops. The dusty auburn of the deciduous scrub jungle takes on myriad subtle tones. The Yellow-throated Bulbul, a muse for the seeking birder, make a fleeting appearance too short to engender a photographic keepsake. Winter warblers are still afoot and I spy the scaly breast of a female Blue-capped Rock Thrush just a few feet from the car window. Avian distractions are plentiful, and not very safe for a driver on a hairpin bend, so I drive downhill and park beyond a curve, entranced by the hypnotic beauty of these flowering trees.

Gliricidia sepium in riotous bloom at Horsley Hills

The sunlight on the treetops burnishes a blush on the tinder-dry landscape. The trees are nearly bare of leaves. Then, the canopy shudders, sending down a rain of flowers. On the macadam, the Tufted Gray Langur nursing her young looks skyward. Up there is her troop, some thirty-strong, feeding. Some of them, like sentries, are staring me down with liquid brown eyes gleaming on the darker field of their faces, their puckered lips a-twitch with trepidation. I peer at them with my binoculars, wondering if they prefer the unripe green pods that are dangling alongside the clusters of closely packed flowers. But it’s not the fruit that draws these monkeys to this neck of the woods. It’s the flowers. Like proverbial lotus-eaters, the Tufted Gray Langurs sit on the boughs, nibbling delicately at the stalks of pink flowers. They seem to be in rapture.

Gliricidia sepium, known as Quickstick and Mother of Cocoa, is native to the Pacific Coast of Central America. Introduced to India as a garden ornamental, it has propagated quickly. The woods of Horsley Hills retain very little of their original vegetation. A look at the unadorned surrounding hillscapes suggest what the topography might have been like had William D Horsley, collector of Kadapa in the 1840s, not “discovered” this hill station for the British administration. Later regimes engendered a spate of social forestry that populated the rocky scrub landscapes with eucalyptus, conifers and a variety of introduced ornamentals that have since proliferated. Gliricidia, too, may have been a garden escapee now well entrenched in these parts.

I am greeted by whoops and whistles of mild alarm as I park and step out of the car. I am being watched by thirty-odd pairs of eyes, big and small. A few minutes later, the langurs decide that I am reasonably unthreatening. They relax. Some of the bolder ones limber down from the trees and fan out over the macadam as they cross the road to the other side, where more Gliricidia await ravenous deflowering.

A motorcyclist approaches. Unperturbed, the monkeys step aside to let him pass.

The Tufted Gray Langur (Semnopithecus priam), formerly treated as a subspecies of the Hanuman Langur, has been called out as a distinct species by taxonomists as a consequence of DNA studies. A tip for field identification: The fur on the head is peaked into a tuft or crest, not very unlike the look Aamir Khan set off in Dil Chahta Hai — it’s easy to see that inspiration came from our own simian forebears.

There are two recognised subspecies of the Tufted Gray Langur — Semnopithecus priam priam, which occurs in the southern Western Ghats and Sri Lanka, and Semnopithecus priam thersites, which occurs in the dry deciduous forests of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. The continuing loss of habitat in Andhra Pradesh has pushed the species into decline, necessitating their classification as Near Threatened by the IUCN.

Devouring the flowers with relish, the monkeys leap nimbly in the treetops, amid much shaking and scattering of the pink petals. The road is now stippled with pink — a welcoming carpet for some dignitary. Since there are few other humans active around here at this time, I can only surmise that the welcome is in my honour.

Many thanks to Karthikeyan Srinivasan for identification of the tree as Gliricidia. His magnificent blog is a fantastic resource for those keen to learn about flowering trees

Posted from Andhra Pradesh, India.

Month: March 2017

Let the sleeping tiger lie – on meeting the big cat on foot

Flowering Gliricidia is a feast for the Tufted Gray Langur

March 2017
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