Post
by Safarigent » Thu Aug 13, 2015 1:48 am
Those people at bamana were labourers shacking in a house and were drunk. At a moment when you have heard shouts of a maneater and need information and are told instead; ye aapki duty hai, humse kyun pooch rahe ho? And after being 'spoken' to sheepishly point out where the shouts came from is helpful. We also had no false warnings from this village after this.
Anyway, the next day; 23 July
Despatch from Devprayag
In morning we got news that the gentleman deputed for the maneater newr khirsu,srinagar hadnt killed the maneater and infact another hunter had been given the permit for the maneater. That eased some pressure off our backs which the local villagers were putting.
Saw quite a few rain quail flying overhead us yesterday while going up to the abandoned road. The plan was for the doctor to hide in a big landslide and tie a bait where the locals had reported the leopards movement, while i was to use the spotlight up and down the road. We also Met the sarpanch who had done the rasta roko which got the dfo to issue the permit. The smell of cowdung smoke is always heavenly when the evening fires are lit to prepare the meals in villages. We saw a couple of ghural, one was on the road infact and barely avoided our jeep! We saw a lovey covey of chukor partridges who gave us a good opportunity to photograph them. The photographs are already on here. And as luck would have it, We also met some traders who were buying and transporting buffaloes and we spoke with them about buying a buffalo calf to be used as an all night bait. The officials promised to look it up. And nothing was done about it. It gets frustrating after a point. Shortly afterwards, the main spotlight conked off. We used the large torch till we got back to the village and plugged in the spare spotlight. Saw owls and civet cats but no leopard! Finally just where we were to park and then walk to retrieve the doc i saw amber lights on a horizontal tree branch.... The jeep was stopped and we tried to ascertain whether the animal was a leopard or not. I couldnt make out the spots although i could see the clearly feline form resting on the branch with its tail hanging down.... The shot was cancelled and we went on to get the doctor. I had forgotten my torch! Had to use the phones light..... Its creepy walking in the dark without adequate light in your hands.... And the knowledge that the owner of those lights might be lurking around. Picked them up. I then handed over the spotlight to another member on the way down as i had been spotting for 3.5 hours continuously and my sprained ankle was killing me. After a quick dinner, the others continued spotting and i went in to tend to my ankle...
The next days morning entry:
A lazy morning as we were recovering from the exertions of the past few nights. we are going to spot at sun down and then again before sunrise. There have been no sightings of the leopards, no scratch marks, no reports of hearing it, no scat, no pug marks. The grim reality is that now only a fresh kill will reveal the leopards movements as we have scoured all over the valley for him. Today and tomorrow are all the days we have because the rest of the team leave on sunday morning and i cant carry on alone here. The permit shall be issues to another local hunter and when he leaves, it'll be issued to us if we want to come back. Seems like the first round went to the leopard......
Added in 5 minutes 39 seconds:
24 July
The new day brought forth no new 'khabar' of the animal and we were now ready to call it a day soon as the doc had to resume his practise on monday and i would be returning to delhi. The plan was for me to sit in a blind all night and for the other team to spot as long as possible. Accordingly, i selected an empty school roof as the place to sit the night out with another team member as my spotter. This school was just across the nepali dera separated from it by a small field, the road and a little shallow feature. Me and my spotter got on... We lay up on an olive green sleeping bag and draped a camouflage net around us. Then we promptly put our heads and down and awaited the darkness. The goat is bleating merrily, Across the bhagirathi, lights start coming on in pauri garhwal. Lightning far off worried one a bit, but the forecast holds true and so does our position. Half an hour of this and i get a call from zaheer that they have seen the leopard heading down the ravine where i had spotted the cat last night on the branch. They are coming to fetch us and the goat and to meet them on the road in 5 minutes. We were on the road, 'bakri samet' just as they arrived and turned the jeep around. We reached the spot where the leopard was seen going down towards the valley. The goat was tied up, where the other day the silent goat had been and we took up places 40 yards away behind a rock fall. The jeep was sent back to spot all the way down and then come
Back up and collect us. This is where fear comes. Here we are, alone on a desolate 6 foot wide mountain road with landslides on it and no human soul or habitation in sight or within hearing distance. This was its home and we were blind intruders hoping to burgle his home by bribing him with a lollypop. The goat resumed bleating. I had left my phone connected to the battery pack and the vibrated alarm when it reached 100% sounded alarmingly loud and jarring in the charges atmosphere of the night. The side of the valley opposite us was bathed in moonlight. Ever since Eid, the moon has been waxing and that has led to more and more visibility; which is good for the leopard, bad for us. Suddenly i heard what sounded like the agitated snorting of an old man. Again and again and again...... The doc whispered that it wasnt a leopard but the alarm call of the same ghural residing here. Never heard that before! They must have seen either us or the leopard. After some time we heard some rocks slip just above the ravine but after no movement we figured it was the ghural at it. Intermittently was heard the most intriguing sound of all..... Mewing, like a cats does. Was what we saw yesterday on the branch a civet cat or a leopard or were our senses playing tricks on us? After some time, we got up and left when the jeep came. After spotting all the down till the village, we all had dinner, strategy was discussed for tomorrow and we turned in for the night. Now that we know the cats path into and out of the valley, it should hopefully be a matter of a few days before the matter is sorted. We are all feeling charged up again and spirits are high in the shikar camp. i had been given the responsibility of selecting a spot and constructing a hide. We were planing on sitting from 6-10 pmand from 2.30-6 am. Believe me when i say, there are more fingers crossed in this shikar camp then were at any contortionists show!
Added in 12 minutes 56 seconds:
25 July
First line from the diary:
Death visited this mountain tonight....
In the morning;
Rudely woken up early morning that a leopard was spotted sitting on a primary school roof in a village next to bhatkot. It was shooed away by the parents and both schools were closed there. We were informed and rushed to the spot. This was by far the worst climb i had undertaken and finally when we reached the apex of the village, we rested on a compound wall next to some cows and the householder served us soft drinks. The school in question was around 300-400' down on the ridge to my right. I decided to give me ankle some rest with another member while the other two went down to the school to look at that area. Within 10 minutes of them leaving, there was a shout of 'bagh aa gaya, bakri le gaya sahab'!!! It was up to me and zaheer to respond. We informed the doc that we were going to investigate. We were rushing downhill for 10 minutes atleast and my ankle finally spoke up. We reached the spot and saw a lady crying on a tiny footpath with a man next to her holding his head in his hands. The leopard had sprang up from below, leapt across the path up the slope, grabbed the goat and took it back down the slope. I relayed this information and then asked the two to throw stones down the slope into the lantana where the animal had disappeared. After a few minutes of doing so, both of them disappeared into the lantana to see what had become of the goat, despite my exhortions not to! Two village boys also followed them down shortly. Me and zaheer followed them down in a few minutes, knowing it to be a bad bad idea. And zaheer bhai wasnt even armed. You dont know fear until you step down a steep mountain slope covered in lantana, the visibility wasnt more than a few feet around us, thorns scratching us all over, Slipping on loose soil and stones, the damp, heavy air of the bush stifling your senses and a hungry maneating leopard somewhere in the vicinity. We finally reached the party and went past them. I stopped 10 feet from the goat. Its hair had been neatly lopped off and kept aside and the stomach had been opened up. But no meat had been eaten. That was a good sign. But where was the leopard? Told everyone to keep quite, and maintain a sharp lookout. I was the the only one with a gun and arranged things as best as i could with no one being able to straighten their backs even while sitting. Eventually the other team members came down. We approached the carcass, did a perfunctory inspection and then i slit open its stomach to let the juices and contents spill out. We then dragged the goat up slipping and stumbling and cursing. The goat was dragged further down to the other small school about 100 yards away and covered with leaves. We decided to wait here tonight and despatch the maneater once it returned as we hoped it would. Preparations were made. The doctor would be on a chair behind a wall inside the school compound and me and the zaheer bhai would be on the roof of the toilet directly above and beside the doc. We had a field of view into a field which was adjacent to the path we had just taken. A drag spoor was made in the evening from beyond where the goat was snatched to the field above where we would tie the live bait. We were in position by 6.30 pm with the carcass up on a tree and the live bait beyond and below it. Lying in the open in the stifling heat and humidity, letting the mosquitos find the spots you didnt apply odomos on while admiring the busy looking glow worms as the sun fades and the stars appear across a monsoon sky was becoming a regular thing but the discipline required, the discomfort and the uneasy muscle were forceful in their arrival everytime. The forecast was for rain and we could hear peals of thunder and see the lightning across us. At 9 pm we decided to call it a day. The doc came up to have a fag with zaheer and they were ribbing me about my africa style of using dead bait and drag spoors etc. then we all started talking about the sheer amount of hard work we had put in for this leopard. Suddenly the goat started bleating, making us shut up and get the spotlight on the bait. The leopard was there, sitting on its haunches facing the goat, between us and the goat. It had heard us but wasnt afraid! shots rang out in the darkness quickly and that was the end of the Maneater of Devprayag. Climbing up after picking up the animal was hell. I rued how swiftly we had run down these very steps in the morning. The villagers kept the leopard to show all the people that it was finally dead. People touching your feet was a haze and we left to pack up and come down to the FRH.
We packed up and slept in the FRH Devprayag. Left in the morning after giving our report. The animal was approximately 6' long, a young healthy adult male. It was in decent shape overall. Skinny though, because it was eating grass to survive. The paucity of preybase in the area left no doubts as to why it became a maneater.
Last words in the diary that night;
Yes, Death visited this mountain tonight. A goat died along with a families investment of 3000 rupees, a maneater died, but most of all, the abject fear of the population died tonight. Death isnt always a tragedy for everyone, no matter how unfortunate.....
To Excellence through Diligence.
Thank you all for taking the trouble and sharing in such detail - Kudos!