Country notebook:m.krishnan

[Sabyasachi Patra]

The Wild Buffaloes don't often get the recognition they deserve. Such massive fellows. Just because we are used to watching domesticated buffaloes so we don't feel anything new in this species. However, one needs to be a bit cautious. Several times in Kaziranga I found that the wild buffalo herds were cautious and ran away on our approach. Except for one which was wallowing and came very closer to inspect us and gave us some looks, one may get the impression that these are tame creatures. Lest one makes such a mistake and get down from vehicle or move closer if you are on foot, one may get a nasty attack.

In Satyamangalam there is a herd of feral buffaloes. They are known to attack man as they perhaps feel they are going to be again captured. A researcher R. Arumugam's assistant was attacked many years ago. The poor man survived with stitches from the local hospital despite some grass and other vegetation remaining within the body. Perhaps the higher level of resistance power of the tribals helped.

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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK: The Wild Buffaloes of Assam : M.Krishnan: The Sunday Statesman: 12 August 2018
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THE WILD BUFFALOES OF ASSAM

" THE WILD BUFFALOES of Assam are really wild --- that is, they have never been tamed. Now, all strains of the familiar village buffalo are descended directly from this wild progenitor and most of them look very like it except that they are smaller and, being domesticated much less aggressive. However,this difference in temperament and build between the wild and the village buffalo is entirely a question of degree and not, as in many other domesticated animals a radical change fixed in the strain.

Take domestic strains of the humped cattle, for instance. In many places in India they have been allowed to run wild and after generations they remain very much what they were. And they finest pedigreed draught breed anywhere, the very distinctive Amrit Mahal was actually evolved under semi-wild conditions so as to improve its mettle and rangy power.

Village buffs, on the other hand, if given their freedom soon become almost indistinguishable from their wild ancestor. The "Wild buffaloes" of Ceylon are really feral, that is domestic stock allowed to run wild. And authentic wild buffalo bulls will seek out village herds and mate with the domesticated cows in them. In fact, near Kaziranga village there is such a wild bull, of imposing proportions.

The point I began with is that Wild Buffaloes in Assam have never been domesticated and that Assam has played a notable part in saving this most magnificent of wild oxen from extinction.

It is a curious fact that although the domesticated buffalo was much-prized all over India 2,000 years ago and exported to other countries, the Wild Buffalo (a peculiarly Indian animal if one excludes Nepal) had a comparatively limited range, more or less confined to the delta areas of eastern India north of the Godavari. It was rapidly wiped out over most of the area, and today it is Assam that is the main stronghold of our Wild Buffalo.

There are several herd distributed over Kaziranga sanctuary but this is not the only sanctuary in Assam which can boast of these noble animals, there are plenty in Manas, and also in the less well-known Laokhowa and Sonai Rupa sanctuaries.

At Mihimukh there was a herd that like many other animals here, permitted a close approach. In Wild Buffaloes the horn is mainly of two types, long sabre-curved and more or less alongside the reck or rising upwards in a steeper curve both horn types occur in the same herd and a cow in the Mihimukh herd (cows generally have longer but thinner horns than the bulls) and quite remarkable horns almost meeting overhead in a circle. The bull of this herd massive and long though not tall, was given to a demonstration that amused me. I took my time gradually getting close to him on elephant back in an aimless-seeming zigzag and every time he felt we were approaching close he would stop stare at us, and then come trotting three steps forwards in an intimidatory gesture to come to a rocking halt about 70 feet away, then he would go back.

Another demonstration indulged in by a long bull we surprised at a wallow was much more the usual threat-gesture of wild oxen, he lowered his head and butted the mire savagely. GAUR bulls and even the bulls of domestic humped cattle demolish termite heaps and mounds of earth in such demonstrations. It is of course wise to halt when any wild animal is demonstrating and beat an unostentatious retreat, but it is my experience that when a Gaur or Buffalo bull really means to charge, he wastes no time on formal demonstrations.

Except that we are familiar with village, buffaloes and that they look so like the wild ones the sanctuaries of Assam would be more renowned for their Buffaloes than even for their Rhinos. Anyway nowhere else is there such a large population of Wild Buffaloes and Assam's achievement in saving these magnificent beasts deserves more acclaim than it has had."


- M. Krishnan

# This was published on 24 June 1968.
* The photograph of a massive buffalo has not been reproduced here.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK : M. Krishnan : Hog-deer : The Sunday Statesman : 2 September 2018
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HOG-DEER
(Kaziranga)

" THE animal I saw most often in the Kaziranga sanctuary, in bush-covered scrub and around bheels was the Hog-Deer -- and still the picture of it here is a zoo specimen.

The Hog-deer has no strongly gregarious feeling like its cousin, the Chital, it goes about by itself, or in a pair or in small parties but both when it is by itself, or in a pair or in small parties but both when it is by itself and when in the company of its fellows, it bolts into cover at the sight or scent of man whether he be on foot or on elephant back. And since it is not a large animal,one needs to get at least within 20 yards for a clear picture even when using a long lens- something I never succeeded in doing I wish now that I had sat up in a hide some likely spot- if wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

The Hog-deer, in spite of its dissimilar looks and habits is so closely related to the Chital that it will interbreed with it in captivity I do not know if in nature the two animals interbreed perhaps not for they favour different grounds and their ranges seldom overlap. In the Kaziranga sanctuary there are no Chitals - it is the domain of the Hog-deer as the Jaldapara sanctuary of Bengal also is.

Why did it get its name? It is said that in its thick body and neck the old stag is somewhat porcine and the gait is also said to pig-like " When running it keeps its head low down and moves without that bounding action go characteristic of deer ", says the unusually reliable Prater in his * Book of Indian Animals *.

This sentence has always puzzled me. Most deer run with the head outstretched not held high, when they are bolting- the Sambar and the Muntjak for instance - I think all deer inhabiting bush-clad scrub or tree jungles where there is undershrub do so, and I have seen Chitals running with their heads stretched out when bolting through scrub country. Furthermore I have seen Hog-deer bound along, sometimes bounding along for quite some distance.

In fact it is only when studying an old stag at close quarters in a zoo that I have been able to see any resemblance to a hog. The somewhat grizzled coat of old males, their thick bodies and thick necks, do suggest a far-fetched resemblance to a boar, but certainly not to our Wild Pig. A peccary, perhaps. In short I can see no justification for the name. When one catches a glimpse of Hog- deer borting through cover, it is quite impossible to mistake them for pig for what one sees then is a flash of chestnut, a colour that no one associates with wild pig. sometime in a fleeting glimpse, and in country where both animals occur, I have not been sure whether what I saw was a hog-deer or a Muntjak, but that is about the only mistake that one can make seeing this deer momentarily- incidentally and irrelevantly, the Muntjak, is another deer which suffers from many misnomers .

At certain bheels in the Baguri area, hog-deer are almost gregarious. They are in several parties close to one another in the mornings and evenings sometimes as many as hundred more or less together. Even when bolting they keep close, so that the question whether they are a group of parties or a herd is somewhat academic. But watching from afar the way the groups grazed somewhat apart when undisturbed I am sure they do not run in herds.

Hog deer fawn are spotted and look very like Chital fawn during their first year of life except that the spots are larger and on a darker ground of chestnut-brown.

All meaty creatures are hunted even such unlikely-seeming creatures as rats and adjutants. Being a grass-eater myself, I have no idea of excellence of hog-deer in a steak or curry but I am told though the vension provided by other deer is even better, the hog-deer is eminently edible. And it is thick and meaty. It is hunted wherever it is found, by every class of hunter from those armed with guns to those armed with bows and arrows. In fact, tribals are so much more its enemies than more sophisticated poachers in protected areas, that if only the hog-deer knew its Shakespeare it can ruminate with a much deeper apprehension than we can over the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune! "

- M. Krishnan

This was published on 14 October 1968

# The photograph of the Hog-deer has not been reproduced here.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK : M. Krishnan : Barasingha :The Sunday Statesman : 28 October 2018
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BARASINGHA

" In KANHA they call their own distinctive variety of the Swamp Deer Cervus duvaucela branderi, the Barasingha. Using the name for this deer in correspondence with some authorities I have, apparently, caused eyebrows to be raised, and in the replies I received the name was put within quotation marks -- " barasingha ".

The Kashmir Stag is also called barasingha, and evidently the contention of some people is that the name should be limited to that animal,and not be applied to Cervus duvauceli, which should be called the swamp deep. There are two subspecies of the swamp deer, one inhabiting swampy ground and marshes in the Terai, Uttar Pradesh, Assam and the Sundarbans*, which has somewhat spongy and splayed hooves and a comparatively larger skull, scientifically distinguished as Cervus duvauceli duvauceli, and the other the branderi of Madhya Pradesh which lives on hard ground and has compact hooves and in the old stags, darker antlers. In both subspecies the number of tines carried by the adult stag varies, but is generally twelve on each antler,which is why the animal is called "barasingha". The Kashmir Stag (which is a cousin of the Scottish Red Deer) has also often twelve points, but more often more, and is also called barasingha. Both deer have other vernacular names.

In the circumstances, I am unable to see the force of the argument that only the Kashmir Stag should be termed barasingha. On the contrary, there is something gained by calling the Kashmir Stag the Hangul (one of the standarized names), and the hard-ground subspecies of Cervus durauceli the barasingha - the name of Swamp deer can then be applied to the other subspecies. Anyway, the alternative, hard-ground swamp deer is a contradiction in terms.

In a note to follow I shall discuss the decline of the noble deer in Madhya Pradesh and possible schemes of reviving it, here I shall merely record what I saw of it in May last in the Kanha National Park.

There were two main herds, consisting of hinds and a few small stags, about 80 animals in both herds together; in one herd there were 3 young fawns and 2 in the other, the objects of peculiar interest and importance, for they represent the future of a dying race. Apart from these two herds, there was a party of 5 big Stags, all in hard horn; among them was a fine animal which carried what were probably the most magnificent antlers of the tribe, and although I never saw him, I heard that there was another lone Stag in a grove near the lodges even more impressive in build and antlers. There are only about a hundred barasingha in all in Kanha today.

During the day the two main herds could often be seen lying down in the open, very relaxed and chewing the cud. Occasionally I saw a deer lying down with the head flat on the ground at the stretch of the neck, a posture that would render it very hard to see even in low, thin cover. Sometimes a stag ran around with a lot of grass entangled in his antlers, and people said this was the silly animal's attempt at camouflage. Actually,it is no such self-conscious effort, barasingha stags clean their antlers mainly by thrashing the grass with them, and this carrying of grass on the horn is merely the result of this instinctive habit.

What impressed me most was the seeming lassitude of the deep. Swamp deer(of both subspecies) are highly gregarious, more gregarious than any other Indian deer, and where they flourish they go about in vast herds, the herds keeping fairly close to one another. There is a survival value in vast numbers,and apparently these deer, like other deer of the cold North and some birds, are rather dependent on their sheer numbers.

However that might be, the two subspecies of the swamp deer are less unapproachable than say, Sambar or Chital (Chital have become rather tame in places, and I refer only to Chital where they are still very shy). Making allowances for all this, I still thought the Barasingha of Kanha rather simple. I do not know if this lassitude is the result of some debilitating infection or not, but the deer were definitely less wild and warythan the Swamp Deer I had seen in definitely Assam and U.P.

A thing that caused much concern to the authorities of the park was that in recent years the breeding of the deer had been infructuous, too many young being still-born. It was heartening to see young fawns in both the main herds. "

- M. Krishnan


This was published on 16 Feb 1969.

#The photograph of two Barasingha Stags not reproduced here.
*The Swamp Deer is extinct in the Sundarbans now.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------COUNTRY NOTEBOOK:M. Krishnan : A Hunter turned scavenger :The Sunday Statesman:9 September 2018
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ADJUTANT STORK

" The Greater Adjutant does occur in the Kaziranga Sanctuary; in fact a pair had nested in a tall red silk-cotton tree near Kaziranga village in 1967-68, but it is a rare bird here. The common stork of the sanctuary is the Lesser Adjutant slightly smaller in size without the fleshy pouch at the throat, and with sparse down on its crown, wholly bald in its larger cousin.

I found it wherever I went, on the edges of bheels, or on the swampy or even on dry open land, hunting insects, frogs, fish and even small reptiles and mammals. It was usually solitary. At times I saw an Adjutant parading its beat, and another a hundred yards away, and a third and even a fourth still further off, in clearings inside the jungle it was usually truly solitary.

It was also in the treetops, singly or a few together in a tree. It did not seem to be gregarious in its roosting here, and on several occasions I saw Adjutants roosting by themselves in some tall tree. But when it soared it was always in a party sometimes as many as two dozen getting together to sail in effortless graceful circles on high. All storks are good fliers and given to soaring and an Adjutant on the wing of a very different bird from its grotesquely ugly and large self on land.

Storks stretch their necks straight out in flight, even when soaring -- in fact this is the token of the flight silhouette by which the tribe can be distinguished, even from a great distance, from the Herons and the Egrets. The Adjutant however, folds back its neck in a tight "S" like a Heron when in the air, so that its neck is invisible in flight and only the long bill jutting out in front and the legs trailing behind serve to distinguish it from a vulture when it is soaring in company on high at such times of course, it can never be mistaken for a heron, for herons are not given to soaring. But often it circles so high that the bill and legs can hardly be seen.

Although it does not seem to congregate at garbage heaps as its greater cousin does, this Adjutant too is given to scavenging, when the opportunity offers. When something dies and vultures gather to feast the Adjutants too are there, to take their share but never in a crowd like vultures -- only one or two, or at best a few along with the regular carrion feeders.

The Adjutant's broadsword bill is not suited to rending flesh, and so it waits till a vulture near it has detached a piece of flesh from the carcass, and then robs it. Feeding vultures are highly rapacious, and gobble up what they are able to tear apart in a great hurry so that any bird robbing them has to be very alert to get any thing at all, but the Adjutant is a fast mover when it has to be.

I watched an Adjutant at a bheel in Bokani for over an hour using the small but efficient telescope that the normal lens of my 35 mm camera becomes when a special eye-piece is screwed on to it. It stood slumped and inert at the water's edge as all hunting waterside birds stand and in repose its neck was partially or even wholly retracted; when it sighted prey, the bill did not dart out at the end of the shot-out neck in a lightning thrust as the bill of herons and darters do but the necks was slowly extended till the great down-pointed bill was above its victim and then with a smooth movement the prey was neatly picked up between the mandibles~for all its seeming resemblance to a broadsword, the bill of the bird is really a giant pair of pincers. I could not always see what prey it had caught, as most of the time the bird rudely turned its back on me, but only once or twice when apparently it had caused a frog, did it jerk, drop and grab the prey to kill it, a fish it caught was held crosswise in the bill at first, then neatly turned lengthwise without being dropped, and finally swallowed, very much in the manner of Black necked Stork.

In February when I was in the sanctuary, the Adjutants were not breeding. But I saw a few nests presumably the previous year's. The bird is said to nest gregariously, but several nests I saw were by themselves, high up red silk-cotton trees."

- M. Krishnan

This was published on 28 October 1968

# The photograph of the Adjutant Stork not reproduced here.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK : M.Krishnan : Darker and Smaller : The Sunday Statesman : 25 November 2018
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DARKER AND SMALLER
(GAUR)

" Over many seasons of observations of Gaur in Mudumalai Sanctuary of Madras, I gained the impression that there are two kinds of them -- the differences between them are not sufficiently marked for any distinction into two sub-species, and they frequent the same forests and are found together, and both kinds are quite distinct from wheat coloured Gaur of the Pulneys I noticed the difference between Gaur years ago when watching a composite herd split into two, the smaller and darker cows, with long, black hair on the threat formed a herd, while the larger, lighter brown cows with no long hair on the throat formed another herd; the herd bulls in either herd were big, but the larger of them went with the larger sized cows.

Now this sanctuary, alongwith the Bandipur Sanctuary of Mysore, is probably the best area in the world to study Gaur, and in subsequent years I kept a sharp lookout for the two kinds I had noticed, in the Karudi AND Theppakkadu areas of Mudumalai Sanctuary.

Gradually I felt surer that there were two kinds, and that not environment but heredity (Gaur herds are largely family parties and both kinds share the same territory) was responsible for their differences.

Once a visit to the Periyar Sanctuary of Kerala in 1960, I noticed that the Gaur herds I saw there were of the larger, browner kind.

I should make it clear here that the differences between two kinds is hard to make out in the adult bulls, whether they are herd bulls or lone bulls and it is the grown cows that one can discern these differences so hard to put into precise words -- in the main, it is that in one kind the cows are smaller, much darker, and with long, black hair on the throat, and that in the other kind the cows are big, varying in coat from a deep umber to a light raw umber and have better developed horns ~ incidentally, the largest bulls I have seen had a distinct brownness to their black, particularly on the flanks. This is not a difference arising from differences in age, for it is clearest in the adult cows of either kind.

The Gaur I saw in the Kanha National Park belonged to the darker and smaller kind.

All the cows I saw had long, black hair on the throat~ I have seen similar, but noticeably smaller cows in the Palamau National Park of Bihar. Although in fine condition and well developed, the Gaur at Kanha (even the biggest bulls) definitely do not attain the size the animals do in the Western Ghats.

Kahna offers exceptional amenities to a herbivore that is mainly a grazer like Gaur, for the rolling maidans offer it excellent pastures. But it is not always that animals follow logic in such matters -- Chital for example, seem to reach their best development (and are most gregarious) in open jungles and scrub, and not in tree forests where the under-shrub is lush.

At Kanha
I think Gaur look their best on open ground. One sees their superb musculature and build to the best advantage in clear lighting against a homogeneous background. At Kanha one can see them in the open maidans, and at times in numbers -- I saw a herd of 27 including the big bull and two calves one evening.

On another occasion I saw three bulls grazing in company on a rise above a nullah. They are more or less of a size (one the oldest was a shade smaller and other two almost identical) very black and shiny and all three past their prime.

Incidentally I believe that the darker and smaller kind of Gaur that the hair slips with old age in the bulls, the black shinning skin showing through. I have seen big bulls of considerable age in the South whose coats were fully covered with hair -- the biggest bull I have ever seen was a uniform Vandyke brown all over."

- M. Krishnan

This was published on 4 May 1969

# The photograph of a large Gaur has not been reproduced here.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK : M. Krishnan : Stag parties in Kanha : The Sunday Statesman : 18 November 2018
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STAG PARTIES IN KANHA
( CHITAL)

" I looked for Stag-parties of Chital in the Kanha National Park. Here, as in places in Uttar Pradesh, the deer can be seen in large herds in comparatively open country, and on somewhat similar ground. In the Masinagudi area of the Mudumalai Sanctuary of Madras, I have repeatedly observed large Stag parties in September- October.

In other gregarious deer, such as Swamp Deer, such seasonal schools of adult males are well known.

Chital are highly gregarious, particularly when living not in tree forests, but in open scrub jungles; but so far as I know, no one before me has reported regular herds of Stags among them. I have watched such Stag-parties in the Masinagudi area over many years -- in September-October herds consisting only of Stags, at times over 150 in strength, can be seen here; some of the Stags are in hard horn, some in velvet and quite a few have polled heads, having just shed their antlers, so that from a distance (and it is hard to get close to these deer in the open country) they look like big hinds.

However, by watching them through glasses as they crossed a ridge in a line, silhouetted against the I had satisfied myself that there were only adult Stags in the herd. Sometimes (and this is true of Swamp deer, too) an old or sub-adult hind or two may be found with a school of Stags, but this does not make it any less of Stag-party.

In Kanha, I was not able to see any large school of Chital Stags. But I was there in May; may be in the cold weather, after the rains, there are big herds of Stags to be seen here too, though the grass and herbage will be obscuringly tall then. However, I did see quite a few small parties,from 3 to 9, consisting entirely of stags. These were in hard horn, and among them were some superb animals, with magnificent antlers. Many of them were limping, and carried flesh wounds.

There is no definite rut, confined to a particular season or part of the year, among Chital, even in North India; Stags in velvet and in hard horn, and very young fawns, may be seen at all seasons. Moreover, the courtship is a rather prolonged process as among most herbivores, though the climatic act of mating is quick, a fact little appreciated by most naturalists and unknown to quite a few of them. As in most deer, Chital stags, when they engage in combat, attack each other from close quarters and with savage fury. The brunt of the sudden forward thrust, with the head lowered and the entire body weight behind it, is usually borne by the clashing, interlocking antlers, one of the combatants gets pushed back after awhile, and disengaging its locked antlers, turns quickly round and runs away, but it does not always escape unscathed; a glancing thrust from the antlers of the opponent, following up, often inflicts a nasty flesh wound. Apparently the limping stags I saw were fellows in misfortune, suffering from such wounds."

- M. Krishnan

This was published on 6 April 1969.

#The photograph of Chital stags in a herd not reproduced here.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK : M. Krishnan : The Slender Loris : The Sunday Statesman : 30 December 2018
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SLENDER LORIS

" By the time I was 41, I had to admit that I had lost my long fight with myself, and that what people euphemistically term the spread of middle age, and botanists more bluntly secondary thickening had overtaken me. And on my forty-first birthday I wrote these lines on the Slender Loris, in envy and regret.

I wish I were a Slender Loris
And not a massive human being.
In such a change of course
Much more is
Lost that is gained, for though agreeing
With men in lacking tail and manners,
On evolution's path it lingers
Bar back' we have reached the
Destination
All the days it sleeps with shaking Fingers
Over sun-shy eyes, no fasination
Lmoels its night; slow-limbed
The stories
Or trees it climbs for insect plunder.
But still I wish I were a loris --
Beyond all argument it's slender

By no means an inspired verse, but factually very sound. The Slender Loris (and even the Slow Loris of north-east India, with its body and limbs much thicker) is a featherweight, the size of a kitten and slim, with a very narrow waist and hard, thin limbs; the great goggle eyes are set on by a patch of dark fur around each of them and as one might guess from its owl-face and big, round orbs, it is a creature of the night.

It is highly arboreal, and spends the day in sleep, deep in the shady cover of a tree top, with its face buried in its chest, bird like and often with its hands over its eyes to shed them from the glare, especially when it is forced to keep awake by day. It is from its round face and its habit of shading its eyes with its hands that it gets its Hindi name, Sharmindi-billi (the bashful cat).

Lorises are among the small creatures the are missed easily, and so are seldom seen.In fact I can recall seeing a loris only thrice-a pair of slow Lorises high up a tree in Bhutan,and a Slender Loris twice in the south, also up trees and on both occasions late in the evening. Unfortunately for it, the slender Loris is credited by superstition with the ability to bring one luck, and its gnomelike looks are so unusual the it is commonly kept in a cage and exhibited in zoos, and as a captive animal (usually exposed to much more glare that it can tolerate) it is by no mean unfamiliar.

It is not only that they do not give it a cage large enough and deadly enough small in sleen in comfort through the day on some suitable perch -- they often give it the wrong diet as well, bread-and-milk and bananas. I do not know if a slender Loris is exclusively insectivorous when wild; perhaps it also eats eggs and even small tree-living lizards when it can find them, and soft fruits and other vegetarian fare. But I am quite sure that it dose need insect food or some suitable substitute.

In fact, its dentition is hardly that of a fruit-eater and, as I learnt in the most unpleasant manner imaginable, it has sharp teeth. To get the picture reproduced here I had the two captive Lorises taken out of their cage and placed on a long length of tamarind bough, with one end planted into the earth. Somehow those Lorises did not want their picture taken. As soon as they were put on the bough, they climbed quickly down and made for the security of their cage, moving over the ground at an awkward, shambling shurie much faster than on the bough, I caught them both and gently redeposited them on the bough, and in the process got a sharp nip from one, which confirmed my views on its dentition.

A man whom I know, who kept a Loris for a pet, told me that the animal once made a bid for liberty, and on being chased, entered a pool of water and swam across, using a rhythmic breast-stroke, only to be caught on reaching the farther bank. I cannot vouch for the accuracy of this report, but believe it, for most animals can swim when they have to."

- M.Krishnan

This was published on 13 July 1969
#The photograph of Lorises has not been reproduced here.