Leopards in Guwahati’s hills jostle for space
On a lazy Sunday morning in June this year, with the pandemic keeping most people indoors, chaos ensued at Katahbari Pahar (hill) area in Guwahati - the rapidly urbanising capital…
Mongabay series: Beyond Protected Areas
Protected areas only cover about 5.02 percent of India’s total area. Consequently, a large percentage of India’s wildlife live outside protected boundaries. This gives rise to situations spanning between coexistence and conflict, which requires acknowledgement and awareness.
Children sketch human-elephant conflict and coexistence in Odisha
A pencil sketch shows an elephant trying to dismantle a thatched roof. Another depicts a pachyderm helping itself to succulent sugarcane stalks from a farm as people brandish fire torches…
States propose minimal eco-sensitive zones around protected areas
India has a countrywide network of protected areas (PAs) including wildlife sanctuaries, national parks and tiger reserves. Owing to the pressures of human habitation and infrastructure development projects the eco-sensitive…
Protecting rivers and involving communities to conserve Himalayas’ shy otters
“We thought otters were cats who came from the jungle and ate fish. We did not know much about otters,” recalls K. B. Rai, a homestay owner in East Sikkim,…
Watching my friendly neighbours, flying foxes
Dusk settles over the city. On cue, the sky brings out its colour palette. As deep oranges and reds take over, the day - with its creatures - shifts. It's…
Mapping conflict hotspots as leopards adapt to unlikely habitats outside protected areas
Unpacking patterns of leopard attacks on livestock and landscape features in the Indian Himalayas offers clues to potential human-leopard conflict hotspots, a study has said amid increasing encounters of wildlife…
Mapping human-elephant conflict hotspots from compensation records
Researchers have unpacked data from compensation records of human-wildlife conflicts in Kerala, to throw light on the hotspots of human-elephant conflicts in the south Indian state that has one of…
Gharials swimming across India-Nepal border an opportunity for enhanced co-operation
School teacher Goutam Tantia recalls being shocked at seeing people put a price on glimpsing a gharial in a village in eastern Bihar, abutting Uttar Dinajpur district of West Bengal. …
Rare Gunther’s toad sighting highlights farms as biodiversity hotspots
“Forests are protected areas in name only. Sometimes we see better protection of biodiversity in the adjacent agricultural lands,” said C.S. Saneesh, a research fellow at Spatial Interaction Ecology Research…
Golden langurs cling to splintered forests and fringe villages in Assam
The Gee’s golden langur, endemic to Bhutan and Assam in India, is one of the world’s most endangered primates. Less than 7000 of the animals remain in the wild today…
