"Rainfed agriculture in India is a risky enterprise, owing to uncertainties in rainfall,” reads a World Bank article published in February 2023. More than half of India's net sown area…
It was a long day here, in Kachchh, when we were out in search of Gujarat’s indigenous breed of sheep, the Patanwadi. There are less than 5,000 sheep of this…
“We had to come to our homes many times in a day from the relief camp we were staying at to take care of our farm and livestock. Now, we…
David Attenborough once described the elusive manul, the world's grumpiest cat. If you were a grumpy cat, you’d probably want to avoid company, too. And what better place for solitude…
The Sherpa Indigenous community in Nepal has lived in the lap of the world’s tallest mountains for centuries. Ever since Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay and New Zealand climber Edmund Hillary…
The Spiti Valley of Himachal is a trans-Himalayan desert where people survive on only one farming season. The Spiti river is the lifeline for agricultural communities in this region. But…
Drawing attention to the restriction of elephant movement due to development and infrastructure barriers, scientists studying genetic differences between elephant populations in the country have expressed concern over genetic differences…
Thiophilus Khojol has been a farmer in Assam's Cachar district on the hill slopes along the Assam-Manipur border, for over 20 years. The district's pineapple production hit an all-time high…
On the outskirts of a bustling New Delhi, the quiet village of Mangar in Haryana has long held a secret in its caves: ancient paintings. Growing up grazing livestock in…
Aesthetically, they may not quite cut it, but these two-tiered sanitation structures, set against the sprawling cold deserts of the Indian Himalayas, have supplied organic manure to local communities for…
The first clear photographic record of two pheasant species in Arunachal Pradesh’s Upper Siang district has brought in a mixed bag of emotions among birding enthusiasts and researchers. The Himalayan…
"पहाड़ का पानी और पहाड़ की जवानी पहाड़ में नहीं रुकती " (the water of the mountains and the youth living in the mountains, never stay in mountains). This local…
Fourteen years after reports noting that India has two separate species of the gibbon - the hoolock gibbon and the eastern hoolock gibbon - a latest genetic analysis has now…
Madan Lal, a farmer from Bagtheru village in Himachal Pradesh's Bilaspur district, was hoping for a good return this year for his wheat crop sown last December. But with scanty…
An analysis of 119 years of rainfall measurements at different rain gauge stations across northeast India, has revealed a decreasing trend in summer rainfall since 1973, including in rainy Meghalaya,…
It is increasingly clear today that the economic prosperity of the world has come at a huge cost to its natural capital. The consequences of unsustainable resource use and environmental…
A mapping exercise for snakes in Uttarakhand, including a component on king cobras, is underway in the Himalayan-foothill state to enable a safer snake-human co-existence. The Uttarakhand forest department is…
Imagine sighting a wild carnivore as you go about your daily chores near your house. Your reactions may range from joy to awe, apprehension, or fear. Or even anger: maybe…
A preliminary study of Pangong lake’s bacterial community structure along the contested India-China Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh has shed light on the influence of increased human actions…
While Kerala's contentious Athirapilly dam may be temporarily on hold due to peoples' resistance, a smaller 7.5 megawatt hydropower project in the vicinity has got both environmentalists and indigenous communities…