WILDLIFE, the term itself takes us to a state of mind where we start thinking of a place covered all around by tall elephant grass, with tall trees in between accompanied by many big illustrious, self-imposing mammals around, along with some beautiful winged mates. Is that all? Indian Board for Wildlife (1970) defines wildlife as “The entire uncultivated flora and fauna of the country”. Unfortunately, with the increase in human population across the globe, there is a rapid decline in forest cover. In India 20.6% of geographical area is under forest cover and that too is under continuous exploitation. Now these green covers are giving way to concrete jungles. Guwahati itself is no exception. But is it completely devoid of wildlife?

Ecologically, when one species is exterminated from a particular geographical area, there becomes a void which again is filled up by some opportunistic species. As we see, on one hand we human beings are exterminating some species and in this process, making way for some new ones. These organisms now can competently share these urban cities with us giving rise to what we like to call ‘urban wildlife’.

To notice one of such kind, we even need not go out of our houses. It’s our overlooked tailed inmate, the common house lizard. These lizards not only share our home but also help us by feeding voraciously on different types on insects, more specifically the mosquitoes. Their density is much more in human habitational areas because of one of the finest creation of Thomas Alva Edison. Yes, it’s the electric bulb. We light bulbs, the bulbs draw insect and the insects draw lizard which eats on them. Beautiful relationship! Scientifically this relationship between us and lizard is called symbiosis.

In a symbiotic relationship between two organisms, both are benefited. But this symbiotic relation is sometime broken by power cuts, but thanks to inverter technology, the relationship is sustained. Among those without backbone... Well! I am not talking about those hypocrites who periodically lure us with fake promises for a better tomorrow. I am taking about a group of animals those really lack backbone and are called invertebrates. Among those by far the most annoying ones may be the mosquitoes and cockroaches. Not far behind are the wasps and flies. But fact is that, these wasps and bees along with butterflies are the most important pollinators. They help in maintaining the floral diversity around.

For most of us caterpillars (bisa) are the ones to be smashed on sight, and truly so as our bitter experience tells. But the fact is they are the one from where our pollinating friends — the butterfly and moth — arise. How barren the land will be without these pollinators; a burning hell! Spider is another creepy crawler that many of us are even afraid of. But some of them have pretty vibrant colour. A residential compound with a little garden area may harbour as much as eight different varieties of spiders. Again on certain summer evenings after an occasional shower, if we are observant enough, we may hear most of the areas near water-filled spots buzz with sound. Most of these sounds are produced by our ignored friends, the frogs. In Guwahati itself, there are around 25 odd species of frogs living with us along with somewhat the same numbers of snakes.

Among the winged neighbours the devilish crow is the most prominent one. But this evil is actually doing a godly work, by scavenging upon waste food that we generate and the carcasses, thus helping keep our surroundings clean. Apart from various other beautiful birds around, we also have highly threatened species of birds amongst us. The greater adjutant stork is one such bird. We have a small population of these birds near the Ulubari fish market, where fish-sellers themselves provide food to these birds. Also small population of these rare birds are there in Cholabeel, Borbari, Gorchuk area and also in Deeporbeel, the lone Ramsar site of Assam. Deeporbeel also harbours a wide variety of other floral and faunal diversity. Even the heart of the city itself has it own fair share of feathered friends; we can see hundreds of kites roosting on the BSNL tower in Pan Bazaar. The plot adjacent to MMC Hospital serves as a breeding ground for many egrets, which seasonally flock to this place in huge numbers.

Spiritually Guwahati is famous for Kamakhya Temple, but this temple apart from being a hub of spirituality, also harbours a wide variety of life forms, the rhesus monkey being the most common one. Reports on the presence of clouded leopard in and around the temple area are also not very uncommon. But by far the most important life form in Kamakhya is our crawling friend, the black soft shell turtle. This animal was thought to be extinct in the wild except of some small population in our own Brahmaputra river system.

From one holy place, through water way we move on to another. This time it’s the river island and home of Lord Shiva, the Umananda. There we can find one of our close cousins, the golden langur. These langurs actually came to this holy island via human intervention. It is said that a devotee from Bhutan once donated a pair of these langurs to the temple which now has risen to about 12 in numbers. Under care of the human inmate of the island, their population is thriving.

A boat-ride to mainland drops one at Sukreshwar Ghat, from where if we barely walk for a minute or two we reach the residence of our deputy commissioner. There itself we can meet the only winged mammal on the earth, the bats. Hanging upside down from the branches of tall trees having a better glimpse of our ‘upside down world’ itself. More seriously, they also play a very important role. When darkness appears they flock together and march over the sky eating anything that come in their path, mainly insects. Also their faeces known as guano has a very high potential to become manure for our agricultural fields, if used. The bats are very special in regards that they can locate objects with the help of sound, a process known as echolocation, thus helping them to hunt in complete darkness. Apart from these, sighting of stray wild animals is frequently reported throughout the city. Does this mean an increase in number of these wild animals in the city’s peripheral forests. Unfortunately, the answer is no. Because of the destruction of their habitat, mainly by human activity, there is shrinkage of living space and scarcity of food for these animals. Thus they come out in and around human habitational area, mainly for easy food procurement. This sometimes results in what we term as ‘man-animal conflict’. But is it really a conflict? We destroy the home of these animals, we use up most of their recourses and then when they are forced to come out, in most cases, scarcity of food and space being the reason, we term it as conflict. Then if these animals are lucky enough, they are rescued and further released. But the methods of release have its own shortcomings too. If these rescued animals are regularly released in the same spot, that also creates an ecological imbalance in that place resulting in artificial over population of the species leading to competition for resources among individuals, which again may draw the animal back to the human habitational area, starting a cycle of release and recapture. Fact is if the animal is given enough time and space, without creating an unnecessary situation, the animal generally tends to move away from human contact. Also if human intervention becomes unavoidable, as far possible information should be passed on to the forest office and officials nearby, who are better equipped to deal with the situation. This way we will not only save the animal but also save us from injuries which could be inflicted by the panicked animal.

Our mother Earth is getting no bigger, but structure of life, mainly the human race is spreading exponentially. Limitation of space and resources will always be a problem. The rate at which the forest and its inmates are vanishing, God forbid, but maybe a day will come where we will be left with only one kind of wild life and that’s ‘urban wildlife’.

jaya_ditya@rediffmail.com

Jayaditya Purkayastha