The flipper tracks of an olive ridley turtle break out of the tideline and veer onto the beach. She has nested somewhere nearby and returned to the sea. We try to look for where she might have dug her nest and laid her eggs. Right adjacent to the beach are large sand dunes, some 40 feet high.  I am walking around in the coastal village of Poigainallur in the Nagapattinam district of Tamil Nadu, India, along with Isaiyamudhan—a friend and fisherman from the neighbouring district of Mayiladuthurai. ‘Poigai’ is the Tamil word for freshwater pond, and this village is not far away from the famous religious town of Velankanni. It’s the last day of a road trip along the central coast of Tamil Nadu visiting fishing villages, talking to people, documenting and understanding the various coastal ecologies along this stretch. I was searching specifically for intact, well-developed coastal sand dune ecosystems—perhaps the most fragile and threatened shore habitats in India.

Sand and tsunami

The previous day, I had visited Parangipettai, a township north of the River Vellar’s estuary in Cuddalore. A place known for its massive coastal dunes in the past, we found that their numbers had significantly reduced, being flattened, built upon, and quarried away. On our way to Poigainallur, we crossed a number of tsunami memorials dedicated to fisherpeople who lost their lives in the worst natural disaster to ever hit the Indian coast in 2004. Isaiyamuthan tells me a beautiful story about Poigainallur and the neighbouring villages, which the land bears witness to. The local fishers and farmers had for a long time had a deep understanding of how indispensable sand dunes were for water security as well as for their lives. Dunescapes take centuries to form. Sand is slow water, a patient fluid, which is moved, shaped, folded by wind, waves, and vegetation. It flows over the years and with the seasons, like a current in deep time. The villagers had the practice of sticking palm fronds on nascent sand heaps in the path of the wind to help their growth by trapping other windblown sand particles. They also buried Palmyra seeds in them, which preserved the dunes as they grew. This practice, thought to have been prevalent once, faded over time as the dunes grew large and the ecosystem services they provided were taken for granted. 

A white-bellied sea eagle soars above us, its body cloud-white and wings coal-black. We see its gliding form through the gaps of palmyra fronds. It then stops circling, buckles its wings, and suddenly dives into the sea, hitting it like a giant arrowhead of flint and granite. When the Indian Ocean tsunami ravaged the eastern coast of India, fisher communities bore the brunt of the disaster. Isaiyamuthan tells me that the force of waves brought the ocean several kilometres inland along these districts. The toll it took on women’s lives was significantly higher compared to men. They were homebound, stuck with children and their chores, and couldn’t escape from the impact zone fast enough. Their hair got stuck in the thorny Prosopis bushes, which have invaded shore habitats, and several of them drowned like that, he recalls, traumatised. Yet in several areas, people observed that sand dunes greatly buffered the impact of the waves and protected them, and villages where houses were located on the dune crests were largely unaffected. Dunes protected coastal communities during this time even better than mangroves and casuarina plantations. The importance of these dune systems was realized then, and since these habitats took a beating from the pummelling waves, the age-old practice of growing and preserving dunes was revived for a time. 

The importance of dunes for local hydrology

A dune lives a slow life, one which is difficult to observe within a single human lifetime. Small vegetation traps windblown sand grains formed by wave action, which slowly accumulate, and are stabilized by grasses like Spinifex, Ipomoea and Fimbristylis. These grasses are also known to help dunes recover after storms and strong winds. As a dune grows, it shelters its landward side from strong salt-laden winds, allowing shrubs and trees to take root. Over time, it grows into a forest. 

The most miraculous thing about coastal dunes is their effect on the local hydrology. In the neighbouring village of Kallar, I had approached some fishermen playing cards under the shade of a dune, after spending the morning out at sea. They testified that the manal medu (sand dune) ‘created’ freshwater and pointed to a hand pump on their beach, located just 30 feet away from the high tide line. I jockeyed its handle and tasted the water. Although a little muddy, it was absolutely fresh. They also mentioned that many dunes here were blown down during the Gaja cyclone in 2018–19, but thanks to the protection the dunes offered, their village was largely untouched. At low tide, I spotted hundreds of wedge clams (Donax cuneatus) popping out of the sand to filter feed from the waves, while crows and egrets attempted to nab their soft, jelly-like bodies before they clammed shut and burrowed back in the sand.

A dunescape acts like a massive percolation chamber and is an extraordinary rainwater harvesting system. Where they are well-developed, the water table is above or at sea level. The undulating sand structures, when saturated with water, form an osmotic shield below the ground, blocking seawater intrusion. Swales—small and sometimes perennial freshwater ponds—form on the landward side of dunes. And within these I discovered swimming tadpoles, dragonfly nymphs, whirligig beetles, diving beetles and water scorpions—freshwater life forms thriving just 200–300 feet away from sea. I saw the fresh scat of a black-naped hare near one pond. Fan-throated Lizards, flicking their blue dewlaps, scampered into the spider-like roots of Pandanus plants growing around the pools. Jamun, Alangium, cashew, bamboo, tall palmyras, and some large banyans were among the trees growing here. Behind the last line of dunes—the largest of them with crests over 30–40 feet high—villagers were cultivating paddy, now nearly ready for harvest. 

The looming threats of sand mining and unplanned development

“That new temple in the next village was built with sand quarried from here,” a woman from Kallar said. According to most of the fisherfolk I spoke to, coastal dunes are severely threatened by construction companies, contractors, and increasing demand in urban areas for building infrastructure. It is sometimes the locals themselves who mine sand on their bullock carts and sell it, due to unemployment and access to quick money. “The younger generation don’t really know why manal medukal are important. Several villages over the years have lost their freshwater due to excessive sand mining.” 

Closer to home in Chennai, the coastal regions to the north of the city have suffered massive erosion and habitat loss where dune habitats and beaches once existed. This is due to unplanned and ecologically destructive coastal projects. Sea walls and groyne fields now taint these shores. However, some dunes still exist in small pockets in the villages of Kattupalli, Kalanji, Senganimedu, and surrounding areas. A few months ago I had taken the Class 11 students of my school on a field trip to north Chennai to witness and understand the changing coastal geography here, and to interact with the fisherpeople. In the village of Kattupalli, we sat around Yashodhamma and listened to her stories. She is a fisherwoman in her sixties, small in stature, but a firebrand activist for the cause of her community since her twenties. She spoke to us of how her community had been brutally evicted from their previous settlement during the construction of the L&T Shipyard, of unkept promises of employment by these large companies, and of her birth village—NTO Kuppam—which had a large beach, where she would play with her siblings, and where you could dock any number of boats. “Fish in those days would be so numerous that sometimes they would come near the shore and just jump and writhe on the sand. We would simply collect them from the beach on such days,” she said. 

This village and several neighbouring ones now exist merely as vestiges on maps. They have been erased by the ocean’s longshore currents, triggered by the building of coastal infrastructure like the L&T shipyard, Kamarajar port, and now the newly proposed Adani Megaport. A study published by Anna University in 2019 shows that the maximum sea intrusion into aquifers in India is on the coast of north Chennai. Groundwater up to 14 km inland has been contaminated with seawater. This leads to the city building more desalination plants for its drinking water supply, exacerbating the ecological impacts on its coast. Yet, in villages like Kattupalli where sand dunes still exist, people get freshwater just a few hundred metres from the shoreline. The swales sparkle with damselflies, and volley with the calls of skittering frogs and other anurans in the evenings. 

Reversing the colonial legacy of ‘wastelands’

In Tamil Nadu, coastal dunes are often classified as ‘Puramboke’ land by the revenue department. Historically, Puramboke in Tamil meant land reserved for shared community use—this included water bodies, grazing land, sand dunes, riverbanks, and mudflats. These were habitats which provided essential ecosystem services, and could not be privately owned or used for agriculture and construction. With the advent of colonialism in India, this word became twisted around to mean ‘wasteland’, in order to divert these common and crucial landscapes for colonial infrastructure and private property. The word even became a pejorative, although there is a movement now to revive and reinvoke its original meaning and significance. It is an interesting exercise to trace how the idea of ‘wasteland’ came to be and follow its roots into the colonial context. From literature, people and travels, I have been able to collect over 140 words for ‘land’ in Tamil. Each word evokes land in its ecological significance, cultural values and practices, and poetic contexts, where land had its own agency, animacy and seasonality. But not one of them describes land as ‘waste’ or ‘useless’. One of the first places where the idea of ‘wasteland’ is systematized is in the English philosopher John Locke’s theory of property, which found its way into Indian law and governance as far back as the 1790s. Locke said “Provisions…produced by … one acre of inclosed and cultivated land are ten times more than those… lying in common” and “land that is left wholly to nature, that hath no improvement of pasturage, tillage or planting, is called, as indeed it is, waste”. The colonial vision of land completely disregarded ecological truths and the communities which depended on them. Woefully, this vision is still carried forward by our governance systems and policies till date. 

Fortunately, sand dunes are recognized under Indian law. They are classified as CRZ-1A areas under the Coastal Regulation Zone rules of the Environment Protection Act (1986). All sand dune ecosystems have the highest legal protection, at the same level as coral reefs, seagrass beds, and mangroves, but this doesn’t ensure their protection unless demarcated by the Coastal Zone Management Authority on their maps. There are a handful of instances where this law has been used to recognize the importance of and protect coastal dune ecosystems. But its implementation is still weak, and dunes are yet to be comprehensively mapped and documented in India. There are several rich sand dune ecosystems I have visited along the North Tamil Nadu coastline, including around Odiyur Lagoon and Uppukali creek, which have not been recognized or demarcated by the Coastal Zone Management Authority, making their conservation a real challenge. 

Coastal habitats and the biodiversity and local communities that depend on them are, and increasingly will be, the first to face the consequences of climate change and strong weather events. If ecosystems like sand dunes are protected, well researched, and celebrated, they can become our crucial first wall of defence—sheltering ecologies, hydrologies, and people. 

Further Reading

• Bhalla, R.S., et al. 2008. Studies on vulnerability and habitat restoration along the Coromandel coast. A post tsunami environment impact report. Foundation for Ecological Research, Advocacy and Learning (FERAL).
• Namboothiri, N., et al. 2008. Policy Brief: Sand Dunes. Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and Environment.
• Praxis. 2005. Village Level People’s Plans : Aspirations, Realities, Challenges. Praxis Institute for Participatory practices, Delhi.

Photographs: Yuvan Aves

The fastest land animal in the world can sprint up to 70 mph, but cannot outrun its own extinction. One hundred years ago there were around 100,000 cheetahs (Acinonyx jubatus) roaming across the African plains and even parts of Asia. Now there are estimated to be only 6000–8000 individuals left on the entire planet. With over 90% of the species’ historical population gone in a century, cheetah conservationists are concerned that we could lose the species, both in the wild and in captivity, in a matter of decades. Thankfully, man’s best friend is helping to protect this fast cat species.

A different kind of cat 

Compared to the other 40 species of cats in the world, the cheetah differs notably from its feline friends—so much that the cheetah was once thought to be more closely related to dogs. These fast felids have a unique claw structure as their claws are semi-retractable, giving their tracks the appearance of a canid’s. Despite this morphological characteristic, the cheetah is a cat through and through and has this special adaptation (along with many others) to allow it to do what it does best—run. 

In addition to top speeds of 60–70 mph, cheetahs also have an acceleration rate of 0–60 mph in 3.4 seconds. They have a long, flexible spine in order to reach great stride lengths of 20–25 feet; a large heart, lungs, adrenal glands, and nasal cavity to process oxygen quickly; and a small head and ears to reduce drag while chasing prey. 

While all of these adaptations allow the cheetah to be quick, there is a trade-off. Many of these adaptations facilitate speed at the cost of more traditional predatory adaptations. For instance, sharp semi-retractable claws help a cheetah gain traction while running, but the constant contact during movement blunts the claws. The cheetah’s small head and large nasal cavity, located above the canine teeth, allow for maximum aerodynamic movement, but limit its jaw strength and canine teeth growth.

In order to be aerodynamic, cheetahs have leaner muscles and are small relative to their cousins in the Panthera family. Females weigh 60–85 pounds and males 80–110, compared to leopards (the next largest African cat), where females and males weigh 65–135 and 85–175 pounds, respectively.

Scaredy cat of the savannah 

These characteristics mean that the cheetah is not well-equipped to stand up to other African predators such as lions, leopards, and hyenas. This leaves them at a disadvantage in arguments that erupt over territory or prey.

Fortunately for the survival of the species, this lightweight cat has developed a behavioural adaptation to compensate for its physical disadvantage—cheetahs are skittish. This animal has evolved to understand that it cannot win in a fight with other predators, but it can win the footrace. Coupled with sharp daytime vision, thanks to their elongated eyes, cheetahs are able to scan the horizon and see threats coming up to three miles away, before making a quick dash. 

Cheetahs are often victims of kleptoparasitism, with other predators, such as hyenas and lions, stealing their prey. Cheetahs are so skittish that they have even been observed being driven away from their kills by baboons and vultures. Fear of competition often leads to cheetahs lowering their predation rate in areas where lions and hyenas are present. And as opposed to most other cat species, they are diurnal hunters, in order to avoid competition from other large predators that hunt at night.

The problem 

Pastoralism is critical to the livelihood and culture of many people in sub-Saharan Africa. As human population increases and more permanent farms replace traditional migratory pastoral practices, predators and humans are more frequently coming into conflict. Too often, the simple solution for farmers is to shoot predators on sight, to alleviate the threat posed to their livestock and livelihood. 

Cheetahs, like many carnivores throughout history, are considered to be a threat to local livestock—predominantly small sheep and goats, which comprise up to 6% of the cheetah’s diet. However, they are disproportionately persecuted because of their high visibility during the day.

Imagine waking up to find that your livelihood and food source have been taken away from you. You instinctively rise in anger and try to prevent this from happening again. You set out to find the culprit and find the cheetah more often than other predators, due to its diurnal behaviour.

This association has helped label the cheetah as a pest to locals. This conflict now commonly occurs all over the globe, in areas where humans are starting to move into traditional carnivore territory. Wolves were exterminated in many parts of the United States, due to persecution from ranchers, who were threatened by the presence of a carnivore near their livestock. The same is happening now with cheetahs throughout Africa. 

Can a big dog be the answer for these big cats? 

Thankfully, a group of conservationists, including Dr. Laurie Marker and Rebecca Klein, came up with a solution—large guard dogs for the local farms. Livestock guardian dogs or LGDs have been used throughout the world to help mitigate conflict between ranchers and carnivores, and protect herds from predation. 

The idea is simple, but it makes sense. Puppies (traditionally Anatolian Shepherds, but some programs also use local Twasa dogs) are introduced to livestock as young pups, to allow them to imprint on the herd and instinctively protect them from predators. 

Because cheetahs are skittish predators that instinctively avoid conflict, the goal of the LGD is to scare away cheetahs by barking. If cheetahs are avoiding flocks, then any losses are caused by another predator, showing farmers that cheetahs are innocent.

At first, the idea was slow to catch on. Local farmers did not want to have another mouth to feed, and they worried that the guardian dogs would potentially go after their flock. 

However, a small group of farmers in Namibia decided to take a chance, once it became known that the LGD’s food, medical expenses, and training were taken care of by the conservation program giving them the puppy. After that, the idea took off. Witnessing their success at keeping flocks safe not only from cheetahs, but other predators as well, more locals wanted their own dog. 

Community conservation is key to the cheetah’s ability to survive. Cheetahs occur in low densities and prefer to be one of the only cat species around, to reduce the probability of kleptoparasitism. This means that a vast majority, around 90% of the wild population lives outside of protected areas, where other predator populations thrive. 

The use of LGDs for livestock protection and cheetah conservation has increased in popularity, and is now being employed by multiple organizations throughout Africa, such as the Cheetah Conservation Fund in Namibia, Cheetah Conservation in Botswana, and Action for Cheetahs in Kenya. 

All organizations specially tailor their program to reflect the culture and needs of locals, and work to change the perception of cheetahs through the local individuals’ own personal experiences. 

Overall, livestock guardian programs tend to be one of the most successful and most beneficial forms of mitigating human-cheetah conflict. Participating pastoralists in various locations have seen a decrease in incidents, if not an elimination  of livestock predation, after receiving and training an LGD.

Further, these programs are so effective that cheetah populations are stabilizing, and in some areas are increasing, where these LGD programs are in place. This gives conservationists hope that, with the help of dogs, the world’s fastest cat might just win the race against extinction. 

Further Reading 

Braun, E. (1994). Helping the cheetah cheat extinction. Animals , 127 (5), 36. 

Dickman, A. J., Macdonald, E. A., & Macdonald, D. W. (2011). A review of financial instruments to pay for predator conservation and encourage human–carnivore coexistence. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 201012972. 

Marker, L. L., Dickman, A. J., & Macdonald, D. W. (2005). Perceived effectiveness of livestock-guarding dogs placed on Namibian farms. Rangeland Ecology & Management , 58 (4), 329-336. 

Potgieter, G., Kerley, G., & Marker, L. (2016). More bark than bite? The role of livestock guarding dogs in predator control on Namibian farmlands. Oryx, 50 (3), 514-522. 

The winter moon, a waxing gibbous, has risen early. On an ancient mango tree on the edge of the paddyland sits a crested hawk-eagle. The last of the bee-eaters dive for one more meal above the ripening paddy. A red-wattled lapwing is pestering a straggly group of unconcerned cattle egrets in a fallow field. In a shadowy stretch of the stream that flows through the paddy field, a small blue kingfisher sketches a sapphire streak. It’s the time of the year when wild berries ripen on thorny bushes, scandents and climbers on the stream bank. The pale pink ones of panal (Glycosmis pentaphylla), the small shiny black thodali (Ziziphus oenoplia), the blush red-tinged green kotta (Microcos paniculata ) and many more shades, sizes, and flavours. Behind the grasses that have turned golden, the velvety new flush of adakkamaniyan (Sphaeranthus indicus) peeps out. Soon their purple globose flower heads will be out, dotting the bunds of the harvested fields.

The midland paddy fields located in the river basins of short but perennial west-flowing rivers of the Western Ghats in Kerala are a threatened ecosystem. These paddy fields form the lowest feature of a micro-watershed (usually 4–30 m above mean sea level) and are of great hydrological and ecological significance. Numerous first-order streams are born here that then join the main rivers in their middle and lower courses. The fields act as a natural reservoir of water that enrich the local groundwater table and provide ‘rooms for rivers’ when they flood during the monsoons. These modified wetlands created over centuries of ploughing, levelling, and unique land and water management practices, are also among the last safe harbours for floral and faunal biodiversity, in what is not a forested terrain and yet, wild.

Paddy fields fringing gently sloping garden lands were a typical feature of the Kerala midland landscape until the late 1980s. We belong to a generation that witnessed the large-scale conversion and reclamation of this singular landscape into garden lands with perennial tree crops and prime real estate. In a state that is perpetually land-hungry, the paddy fields were also the quick answer to all developmental projects that required contiguous land such as airports, colleges, hospitals, and bus stations. The host of challenges that paddy farming faced during this time—from high labour cost to low produce price—accelerated the pace of the conversion. By the time the Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Act, 2008, came into effect, nearly 80% (6000 sq. km) of paddy fields in the state had already been converted. Four decades of widespread conversions have left us with merely 1900 sq. km of paddylands, which include the larger Kole and Kuttanad lowland paddy systems (1). The fragmented midland paddy fields constitute about half of this.

Hidden pockets of biodiversity

The typical midland paddyland is 10–100 hectares (0.01–1 sq. km), often partitioned by a stream flowing through the middle. Smaller watercourses and manmade canals criss-cross the field for irrigation and drainage needs. The stream networks link together various small ponds within the field and tanks in the bordering garden lands. There are subtle variations in the biodiversity found in and around the paddy fields. Medium-statured trees, shrubs and creepers have established in the pond and field margins, while bamboos and tall grasses abound on the stream banks and bunds. There is a dominance of ephemeral herbs and shrubs that complete their life cycle within a season or two. Grasses and sedges grow on the stream and in-field bunds and in the fields themselves, and get razed by manmade fires during harsh summers. The plants that are found here have successfully adapted to short periods of monsoon flooding. Most herbaceous species seed profusely. The shrubs are hardy, deep-rooted, and are also copious seeders.

Paddy fields provide sanctuary to essentially two types of floral biodiversity—niche plants exclusive to paddy fields, and those trees, shrubs, herbs, grasses and sedges that have been banished from garden lands and homesteads. The midland paddy fields are now arks of biodiversity that were previously abundant in poramboke lands (2), multi-tiered homestead lands, public spaces, and along roads and water courses. With the increase in population and built- up land, regular cleaning drives by the MGNREGS (3) workforce and annexation by more aggressive invasive plants, public and private spaces are now hostile towards unruly, nameless and untamed plants that are ‘weeds’. Weed clumps are now suspect spaces that hide poisonous reptiles, where household wastes get dumped surreptitiously and which mar the ‘neat and safe’ ideal of a living space that is the new aspiration. Live fences where shrub and creeper diversities flourished have also given way to brick and mortar walls. The fragmentation and gentrification of the Kerala homestead landscape, and rapid loss of other public spaces has left a limited homogenous collection of trees and ornamental plants that are deemed ‘useful’, ‘beautiful’ and ‘innocuous’. The paddy fields that survived the conversion and reclamation phase are the only spaces that have remained relatively untouched by this massive taming drive.

Considered ‘useless’, this seemingly unimpressive floral diversity of paddy fields hosts a large faunal population ranging from arthropods and molluscs, to wetland birds, reptiles and amphibians, and mammals like mongooses, civets, and jackals.

Glimpses of human linkages

As socio-cultural commons contained within and surrounding private ownership, the paddy fields had once played an incomparable role in Kerala’s midland life and livelihood sphere. A variety of delectable greens, fish, and molluscs assured nutritional security, especially during the raging monsoons. The herb and shrub diversity contained diverse medicinal plants, which were used for making ayurvedic and home remedies to treat a host of health conditions. Many of the seasonal herbs were treasured for their cosmetic properties and applications in hair, skin, and eye care. The knowledge of plant properties and habitats were passed on orally as evocative plant names, or as oft-repeated adage and lore. Take for instance, the wide variety of edible wild spinach found in this habitat. Common names are suffixed with cheera (spinach), by which they are marked as edible. Often the prefix describes either its habitat (Tottucheera/Parambucheera), its nature (Mullancheera/Maracheera/ Paalcheera)/Kozhuppacheera), resemblance (Nellicheera) or the preparation it is best suited for (Achharcheera/Sambaarcheera). The wild berries and fruits were the staple of rampaging children, who spent summer vacations in these fields, which were transformed into playgrounds for the season. These plants, their nomenclature, uses, and the paddy land pockets that they grow in are being slowly forgotten, with little use and none to treasure them.

Even when privately owned, the midland paddy fields defy strict boundaries of use and ownership. The stream banks, bunds, and live fences are treated as common property, even if they have ownership rights ascribed to them. What’s more, the seasonal nature of cultivation, the indirect benefits of sharing, such as manuring of the field by grazing cattle, the sheer vastness of the area, and the socio-cultural history of use, have fostered a fragile overlapping of property regimes. The absentee-ownership of land during the decline of paddy farming also allowed for an alternate informal steward class to develop, mostly from the socially and economically marginalised communities and castes. These user communities had a seasonal dependence on paddylands, which supported numerous subsidiary livelihoods.

The plentiful and diverse grasses of the fields were an assured source of fresh feed for cows and goats. They were brought to graze on stream bunds and in the fallow fields, during the summer. The abundant fish catch during the monsoons was another income bolster. Transhumance of ducks in the harvested fields fostered migrant livelihoods. Several medicinal plants were harvested in bulk from the paddy fields for supply in the local market. The Pandanus protecting the stream banks from erosion were used in mat weaving. Even flowers of Pandanus, called Ketaki in Sanskrit, were used to perfume wardrobes. The streams themselves were used for retting of coconut fronds that were then used as roofing material. The livelihood dependence seems to have stood the test of time. These paddy fields are the only common grazing lands left for the local livestock, the transhumance of ducks has prevailed, and fishing is still practised. However, mat weaving is rare today, while Pandanus itself is disappearing from the fields—a sad instance of vanishing co-existence.

Changes in sociocultural fabric

With decline in commons across the state, the paddy fields now offer rare outdoor spaces for stepping out in the evenings with company, a place to hang out for the elderly and the youth, secluded spots for alcohol consumption, and outdoor locations for wedding photoshoots.

Since the Act of 2008 and the restrictions therein, there is a grudging slowdown in the conversion of midland paddylands. Aided by several government programmes for encouraging rice cultivation in the paddy fallows, widely adopted mechanisation of operations, assured minimum support price for paddy, and guaranteed government procurement, what is left of the midland paddy fields is slowly being cultivated once more. However, threats still loom or are around the corner—potential land acquisitions for petroleum storage facilities, new highways, and airports. The entertainment industry is also beginning to use these paddylands as novel aesthetic spaces.

Yet, hope lies in our collective effort to live consciously and recognize our role in this diverse world, and the many interdependencies and feedback mechanisms that sustain our ecosystems. On a weekend winter morning, black-headed ibises, purple moorhens and western reef egrets forage in the open waters, starlings create patterns in the sky, bee-eaters and drongos feast on insects (pests, we think) above strips of ripening paddy crop. Sitting on the bund is a pair of boys awaiting a fresh catch with their modern angling gadget. An egg-sac of a praying mantis clasps a blade of grass on the trail. What else are these but reminders that we are part of an intricate web of food and life?

Footnotes:

(1) The Kole-Kuttanad wetland system is located 2-3 meters below sea level, contiguous with the Vembanad estuary on its North and South. Paddy is cultivated only during summers by pumping out water from the polders, which are protected by earthen embankments. It is the second largest Ramsar site in India after the Sunderbans.

(2) ‘Poramboke’ refers to unassessed lands outside of revenue records vested with the government. The term is usually associated with ‘waste lands’, even though these were often rich abodes of biodiversity.

(3) MGNREGS or Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme aims at enhancing rural livelihood security by guaranteeing hundred days of wage- employment in a financial year to a rural household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work.

Can you imagine living in a world without roads? A world where we would be walking through thick forests or deserts, or hiking up and down mountains to arrive at our destination. Probably without realising it, we consider roads to be a part of the positive spaces in which we live. However, have you ever stopped to wonder what we lose when we pave new roads?

While roads connect various types of human settlements, they also form “linear infrastructure intrusions” through natural habitats such as forests, oceans and grasslands. Roads cut through forests forming fragmented patches of what was originally a contiguous natural habitat. This is very disorienting for animals, as roads often become barriers to movement of animals across the landscape. Herds and flocks are often separated by these divisions. For animals with home ranges larger than the given patch, this causes immense stress. They are forced to find all their resources, including food, shelter, and mates, within the smaller area they are left with, thereby exhausting resources, causing inbreeding and the faster spread of diseases. This fate has befallen several animal species that are rare and endemic to certain areas, such as orangutans, which are only found in Borneo and Sumatra. As humans rapidly “develop the land” we run the risk of further boxing orangutans into smaller habitats, ensuring their extinction.

Roads cutting through forests or other terrestrial landscapes are a major cause of animal mortality worldwide. Vehicular collisions with crossing animals are extremely commonplace on highways surrounded by natural landscapes or on smooth roads, where traffic drives at extremely high speeds.

Most of you would have encountered an animal crossing in front of your car, and you may or not have been able to stop, depending on the speed and situation. While conducting research for my masters’ thesis in Madagascar, a biodiverse island along the eastern coast of South Africa, I often found snakes and chameleons crossing the roads. Sometimes I found the snakes near urban areas on heavy traffic roads, while at other times they jumped or slithered away quickly on dirt roads in rural remote areas. So, I have personally encountered situations where I was able to successfully slow down or go around the animal and save them without disrupting traffic or landing in an accident. This was mostly thanks to the island having very less vehicular traffic in most areas and dirt roads in other areas. But I have also had the experience of applying the brakes very suddenly on a smooth single-lane highway to save a bird and its chicks crossing the road, naturally followed by my dad shouting at me, and lots of angry honking from the cars behind me (I am a wildlife ecologist, couldn’t help it!).

In the time after my bachelor’s degree, I was in Coorg, Karnataka, volunteering with the Western Ghats Nature Foundation—an NGO working on wildlife conservation. Considering my love for reptiles, when
I heard from a friend about multiple dead snakes on an interstate highway connecting Karnataka and Kerala, I just had to go and see for myself to get numbers and species names. The highway had been recently renovated at the time of the study and was lined by forested areas on both sides. It cut through
the Brahmagiri Wildlife Sanctuary in the Western Ghats, which is recognised as a global biodiversity hotspot. I would wake up early every day and ask one of my friends from the NGO to take me as a pillion on his bike to this highway stretch. We would let the bike crawl at the speed of a snail and I would scan the road for any dead animals. In a period of just eight days, I found a total of 117 road killed animals on a roughly 18 km stretch of the highway. You won’t believe it, more than 60 (!!) of these were reptiles! This number was the highest amongst all the animal groups I found roadkill for, including amphibians, reptiles, insects and mammals. If lizards and snakes are to be counted separately within reptiles, snakes had higher incidences of mortality than lizards (I have a particular soft corner for snakes, so definitely not good news!). What made it worse was that I found so many beautiful snake species that I had not had the chance to see to date in the wild. Many of these species, such as the hump-nosed viper, the Malabar pit viper, and the Travancore wolf snake are also endemic to the Western Ghats. Being a herpetologist–a person who studies reptiles and amphibians–this was particularly heartbreaking.

Reptiles often cross roads to go from one patch to the other, but they can also be found simply sitting on the roads (Really, what joy is found in doing this?). They are cold-blooded animals who regulate their body temperature by behavioural means. They take shelter in shaded areas when their body heats up and come out in the sun when their body gets too cold. Certain areas, such as rocks or tar roads, are particularly beneficial for them to gain heat (basking in the sun). These surfaces heat up quicker in the day time as compared to the surrounding areas and lose heat slower than their surroundings at night. So, it is possible to find a snake coiled and chilling (actually trying to get warm) right in the middle of the road where the canopy of the forest does not obstruct the sun’s light. I did find a dead snake in exactly that position! It was a beautiful coral snake with a shiny black and red body, a rare one to encounter when you go looking in the forest. But I hope you might now understand why reptiles are particularly at risk of being run over by vehicles on the road. To add to this, there is the problem of their small size, which might render them invisible to vehicles moving at high speeds. And in India, snakes in particular are frowned upon. People often go out of their way to run one over if they see it crossing the road. It is sad, but true. That snake did no harm to anyone and was probably on its way to find a nice chick to hang out with. Alas!

Setting my sadness aside, I mapped out whatever data I had collected and located hotspots on that 18 km stretch of the highway, where more than one snake roadkill was found. I did this because I thought there may be some places with higher probability of snakes crossing the roads. And if we can do something at those locations to prevent roadkills, it would make some difference to these creatures at least. There are several solutions to such animal road mortalities. Some of the simplest ones include introducing speed limits and speed breakers, which allow the driver to slow down in time and may also allow animals to escape; reduction in traffic volume by regulating the number of vehicles allowed each day, especially during festivals and holidays; and temporary closure of roads, such as at night, when a majority of snake species are active, or during the breeding season of vulnerable species when their activity may be higher. Other mitigation measures for reptile roadkills include the construction of underpasses or culverts (underground pipes) along with fences. The fences can help prevent the animals from crossing the roads and direct their movement towards the underpasses or culverts, where they can cross safely. We could also place metal boards on the sides of roads which would heat up like the roads, and may be encountered and preferred by reptiles for basking, before they come onto the road.

Apart from reptiles, I found several other dead animals, including monkeys, during the survey. I suspect that the primary cause of higher mammal deaths is the irresponsible behaviour of people passing through the area, who were often observed stopping by to feed troops of monkeys. Such easy access to food would naturally bring the monkeys closer to the roads more often. Unfortunately, this may be particularly prevalent due to the mythological association of monkeys with the Hindu god Hanuman. A simple way to resolve this issue would be to ban the stopping of cars along this forested stretch of the highway, which would require more regular patrolling by the forest department or the local police, both of which have offices nearby.

Most animal roadkill mitigation measures do not require too much effort or monetary funds, and can be introduced before, during, or after road construction. It is our responsibility to at least provide animals safe passage within their natural habitats. Further studies could better inform our decisions pertaining to suitable mitigation measures. Hence, many conservation organisations have come up with phone applications–for example, ‘Roadkills’ and ‘Road Watch’–which let you record roadkills.

So the next time you’re on the road, I hope you have one of these apps on your phone, avoid overspeeding, keep an eye out for wild animals while crossing green areas, and record any roadkills you encounter so that scientists and wildlife conservationists can use the data to save some animals, if not all, from extinction.

P.S. This might also help you see some animals that you may never see during the wildlife safaris you pay heavily for. I once saw an aardwolf (go Google!) while driving on the road in South Africa and trust me, it is one of my most cherished sightings ever!

(Right: Illustration of the process of transformation of natural landscapes due to deforestation and clearing for development of linear infrastructure such as roads)

Further reading

Bansal, U. 2020. A study of reptile road mortalities on an inter-state highway in the Western Ghats, India and suggestion of suitable mitigation measures. Captive and Field Herpetology, 4.

Glista, D.J., DeVault, T.L., DeWoody, J.A. (2009). A review of mitigation measures for reducing wildlife mortality on roadways. Landscape and urban planning, 91, 1–7.

Trombulak, S.C., Frissell, C.A. (2000) Review of ecological effects of roads on terrestrial and aquatic communities. Conservation biology, 14, 18–30.

Sitting outside on a bed frame between my guides and friends, Anirudh Vasava and Niyati Patel, I have a view of the large pond in Traj, a village in the Kheda district of Gujarat, India. We are here to talk to Hemant Ode, the father of a girl who was killed by a mugger crocodile (Crocodilus palustris) at the washing place, a short distance from us. A cow is tethered near us, and four water buffaloes graze nearby. Hemant sits with us, while his wife, Naniben, watches us from the veranda of their house, a few steps away. The smell of wet cow dung, which she has been using to coat the floor, hangs in the air.

Their daughter, Hetal Ode, was washing a large steel pot in the pond. A few other children were swimming nearby. When the pot fell into the water, she had to wade out until she was waist-deep to fetch it. This was when the crocodile seized her by the wrist and pulled her under. Adults were called, and they searched for her without success. After 30 minutes, the mugger surfaced with the girl. The villagers chased it into the shallow water and recovered her body. Hetal was nine years old, the only child of Hemant and Naniben Ode.

The study of such tragic incidents, and the responses of locals and the authorities to them, is a growing topic in conservation science. A new journal, Frontiers in Conservation Science, features a whole section focused on such negative human-wildlife interactions. As a result of climate change, human expansion into wildlife habitats, and successful conservation efforts, encounters with wildlife are increasing. Most studies of such encounters focus on things that go wrong. Conservationists use their knowledge of wild animals to try preventing bad things from happening, and to persuade and help locals to live safely alongside damage- causing wildlife.

While this is important and useful work, it has resulted in a focus on the negative interactions between humans and wildlife—“human-wildlife conflict”—as well as on human-human conflicts over how to deal with these problems. Much of this work focuses on the harm wild animals cause, and on trying to compensate for this through monetary payments or offering economic benefits for tolerating damage caused by wildlife. This means we have not paid enough attention to where things do work well and people coexist with wildlife. In turn, we also overlook the many non-economic dimensions of people’s relationship with wildlife and the natural world.

But what is meant by ‘coexistence’?

Simply put, it refers to a sustainable although dynamic state (there will be ups and downs, as negative interactions will sometimes occur), where humans and wildlife adapt to sharing landscapes. Tolerance can be passive. For example, not killing a predator which kills your domestic animal. Tolerance can also be active, by taking steps to avoid conflict, such as building islands for muggers to bask on safely and reduce encounters on the shore, as done in the village pond at Deva, Anand district, Gujarat. Importantly, human interactions with wildlife must be effectively governed to ensure wildlife populations persist. We believe such governance will only work if it is socially accepted, locals are represented and involved, and management ensures tolerable risk levels.

I came to the Charotar region of Gujarat to witness the coexistence of locals with crocodiles described by regional crocodile experts—Dr. Raju Vyas and Anirudh Vasava of the Vidyanagar Nature Club (VNC). VNC has been running a successful annual Charotar Crocodile Count since 2013, involving local residents, schoolchildren, and wildlife enthusiasts from all over India, in observing crocodiles and learning about their ecological role in the region’s wetlands. In a survey of mugger attacks conducted during VNC crocodile counts (2013–15), Vasava and his team learnt about four attacks on humans between 2009–2014. These incidents occurred in the villages of Traj, Deva and Heranj, and there have been a handful of attacks since then. The VNC survey also recorded attacks on livestock in the villages of Laval, Malataj, Traj, Changa, Heranj, Dabhou, and Dali. Despite these attacks, these communities are widely tolerant of muggers, and there are many recorded ‘rescues’ (16 between August 2013–November 2014), wherein crocodiles were removed from areas where they pose a risk to humans or livestock, and were either released back into the village pond, or transported for release in the Pariyej wetland.

Vishal Mistry, an expert local natural historian and VNC member, brought us to meet Hemant Ode.
I had not come to Traj to hear about conflicts and hatred for crocodiles, but to learn about this man’s extraordinary response to the tragic loss of his daughter, Hetal, to a crocodile. First, it is important to stress that both parents were still clearly devastated by their loss. A head-and-shoulders photograph of Hetal hangs on the front wall outside of their home. A pretty, smiling girl in a blue dress looks out from a wooden frame with a gold rim. A simple glass bead necklace hugs the frame (presumably Hetal’s).

Hemant is 42, a lean man with a lantern jaw. He grew up in the village and remembers no attacks from his childhood. He wasn’t even warned by his father or grandfather to be careful around the crocodiles in the pond. The village committee leases the pond to fishermen, who come every year to net fish. They catch and tether larger muggers on the bank, to keep them out of the way until they are done fishing. The children sometimes come and tease these muggers, and should be more careful not to get nipped, Hemant says.

Remarkably, following the loss of his daughter, Hemant has not campaigned to have the mugger killed or removed from the pond. He is nevertheless afraid to go near the water now, and says you should be cautious of crocodiles. “If you tease them, harm will come to you,” he says. Removing muggers known to locals will result in new and unknown muggers moving in, he reasons. Hemant does not have negative feelings towards crocodiles. In fact, he has become a mugger mitra, joining a ‘crocodile’s friend’ scheme and advising people on staying safe around crocodiles. He has even participated in two mugger rescues– capturing and removing crocodiles from places where they might pose a threat to humans.

Myth, message, meaning

Hemant tells us that a good strategy for raising local awareness is through the Hindu goddess Khodiyar, who is always shown riding on the back of or standing next to a mugger. The story of Khodiyar originated in Gujarat around 1,300 years ago. Of magical birth, she got her name through an injury to her foot, while on a journey to fetch a remedy for her brother, who was bitten by a snake. Limping, she was helped by a mugger crocodile, who carried her on its back, and for this service she came to be worshipped as Khodiyar maa. She is still widely worshipped in the region, answering prayers, healing and protecting her adherents (not specifically from crocodiles).

Hemant and Naniben were eventually paid a small amount of compensation for the loss of their daughter, but this had minimal impact on their attitudes towards crocodiles. Studying the situation at Traj as a conflict would miss quite a lot of what is happening here. More recently, an old man named Lakshman Chavda was killed by a crocodile in the same village pond. He had been advised against getting into the water, but continued to take long baths in the pond. Later, in the office of the village sarpanch (mayor) Ajay C Patel, Lakshman’s son, Manish, told us that nobody is to blame because it is well-known that crocodiles are present and the responsibility to be careful lies with people. Manish told us he wasn’t angry with the crocodile when the attack occurred, but only anxious to recover his father’s body (Lakshman’s body was recovered the morning after the attack, bitten but not consumed). The sarpanch, a stocky, active man with close-cropped hair, says that crocodiles have lived in the pond for a very long time, and are a part of local life. Fishing is allowed in the pond, but enough fish are left for the crocodiles. The mugger that attacked Lakshman Chavda was caught (there was some debate over whether the right one was caught!), and removed to a nearby wetland, Pariyej. Warning signs have been erected and the village council has applied to the Forest Department for a Crocodile Exclusion Enclosure.

In our recent paper published in the journal Conservation Biology, Anirudh Vasava, Saloni Bhatia, and I argue that it is in shared landscapes such as these Indian farmlands, that human-wildlife interactions should be studied, rather than in and around conservation’s more traditional focus—protected areas. Coexistence does not mean there isn’t any conflict. We spoke with villagers in the neighbouring Vadodara district, who didn’t want crocodiles living nearby. Some hinted at wanting to kill them, but feared prosecution. Coexistence occurs where there are ways of dealing with the occasional harmful event in ways acceptable to locals, and where there is tolerance for the animals responsible for them, as demonstrated by the remarkable villagers of Traj. Of course, this doesn’t just involve studying how humans interact with wildlife, but also studying how animals like large crocodiles have adapted to living (for the most part), peaceably alongside humans.

Studying coexistence with wildlife requires different skills to those usually used by conservation scientists. It is important to think through what it means to interact with local people, often with different customs, spiritual beliefs, social norms, and economic status. Researchers have an ethical duty to ensure no harm comes to those they work with. Asking people about traumatic events requires empathy and tact, and putting the feelings of interviewees first. This kind of research takes a long time, and is best done in collaboration with local experts and field workers. It is important to approach communities in the proper way, get necessary permissions and earn people’s trust, while also taking into account the concerns of local institutions and the government too.

Management recommendations for human-wildlife conflict scenarios mostly focus on prevention and one-off or short-term compensation measures, but we should remember that people’s lives may be changed forever, and attitudes deeply affected in the long term, by traumatic encounters with wildlife. Researchers should also remember that after they have gone, or their papers have been published, it is the locals and the local authorities who continue living with wildlife. In areas of the world where significant wildlife persists outside of protected areas, these populations still exist largely because of varying degrees of long-term human-wildlife coexistence.

Studying coexistence where it occurs in the world, respectfully and using the appropriate methods, will greatly enhance our understanding of the ways in which humans and wildlife can coexist. It can reveal how different values systems and cultures promote tolerance of wildlife. It can also highlight other dimensions to consider, besides rational decision-making based on calculations of costs and benefits. In these challenging times for biodiversity, it will also (while acknowledging harms and conflicts) bring us stories of hope, and grounds for optimism that we can coexist with wild animals.

On my way back to Ahmedabad at the end of my visit, I received a text from Vishal Mistry with a photo of Hemant Ode next to the trap they had used to catch the crocodile that had attacked Lakshman in the pond at Traj. It had been on its way home, from where it was released in the Pariyej wetland. We have much to learn about managing human-crocodile interactions, but this story gives me hope that we can do so in ways that allow both to flourish together.

Further reading

Pooley, S., S. Bhatia and A. G. Vasava. 2020. Rethinking the study of human-wildlife coexistence. Conservation Biology, Early View: https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13653

Vasava, A. G., D. Patel, R. Vyas and V. Mistry. 2015. Crocs of Charotar: status, distribution and conservation of mugger crocodiles in Charotar Region, Gujarat, India. Vallabh Vidyanagar, India: Voluntary Nature Conservancy.