HUMANS - WILDLIFE: CONFLICT OR COEXISTENCE?

HUMANS - WILDLIFE: CONFLICT OR COEXISTENCE?

We admire Tigers, Leopards, Elephants, Wild boars, Cheetals, Gaurs all this to see them in Wildlife Sanctuaries, National Parks and on the screens of our television sets. But when these beautiful creatures start prowling our villages, cities, school or sometimes offices, they become a menace and a potential threat to humans. Wild animals often stray in villages and farms in and protected areas and sanctuaries, having interactions with humans. And now increasingly we are seeing wild animals wandering into urban areas as happened with leopard in Bangalore, a oldest incident were the wild animal going on a rampage in the city of Mysore a couple of years ago. This kind of incidents ends in conflicts between humans and animals with causalities on both sides.  When we question, why is this interaction happening? Researchers say that, when forested areas which are their prey base- are destroyed and corridors of their free movement are encroached upon for the developmental activities cause conflict. Animals are bound to stray into human territory; they are not consolidated for only National parks or Sanctuaries. This is the very small community occupying a smaller space compared to the 1.31 billion human populations what has occupied for their needs.

Looking to the past, even though man worshipped Tiger, Lion Peacock, in the form of religion and art in his culture, he had a serious competition with wildlife all through this period. Our ancestors being a large sized Omnivore they ate the same as any wild animal did. With much advancement in the lifestyle of man, this gave a serious challenge for survival in the ecosystem. Due to agriculture it made man to modify the large scale of land and exclude the animals which were under conflict with him in his habitat. Due to livestock grazing, created competition between the wild herbivores and domesticated animals for food. Later on with the development of fire arms he played a clear dominance on the wild animals.  We always say that wild animals are dangerous and they habitually kill people, but it is not so they always shun humans and flee from them. Wild animals always stayed in close proximity to the humans and also they are so today the reason is only that they avoided human and by not attacking.

   The conflicts which involve are crop raiding, livestock depredation; predation and killing of people which are always coined as human-wildlife conflict without finding the actual cause for it.  Today you pick up any daily newspaper you will get to see the news highlighted on Human-Animal interaction which always seems to be one sided story. Whereas no one reports poaching or any illegal activities going on, some get highlighted but the majority of it goes unreported and undetected. I wander that if animals had a source for reporting there would be piles of reporting’s from them. Let us see in particular about the interactions caused.

Human-Herbivore interaction:

The common interaction we can find in herbivores is the crop raiding, which has given significant rise to conflict between local communities. This has gained a considerable attention, and the animals involved in this are the Wild boar, Spotted dear, Sambar, Gaur, and Elephants. The issue of human-elephant interactions has become increasingly in the district of Hasan, Uttara Kannada and many other where the human population has been expanded into elephant habitat and also the elephant population is been recovered from the conservation efforts. Since it is the large majestic animal with larger requirements it tries to find the space for itself and comes with serious conflict with people around. But if we compare the economic losses of crop raiding with the losses from pests, diseases and drought it is nothing major. Declaring the animal as vermin and allow mass hunting of these animals is not the solution. 

By mass hunting its range gets collapsed and the animal may go extinct in future. Instead we can practice some traditional methods of mitigation and allow them some space to survive. There are several techniques practiced in many states and are proved to be successful for some extent. 

Human-Carnivore Interaction:

It is commonly said that carnivore are dangerous and they attack on livestock and humans to prey on, which causes a significant economic impact on farmers and mankind. They kill livestock but it is said that they are always scared from the humans and always avoid their presence. As Dr. Ullas Karanth says a” tiger or leopard does not look at a human being and a cow as the same”, we need to understand the ecology and behavior of carnivores. Researchers categorize the attacks of carnivores as provoked attacks and unprovoked attacks. Provoked attacks include when a person enters an animal’s personnel space or purposefully tries to touch, injure or kill the animal and the animal attacks, or the human food or garbage attractants that bought the animal nearby and in return the animal reacts to the presence of the humans. 

Animal may be aggressive particularly due to the presence of offspring which require defending, and obtain food due to hunger, thus becoming less tolerant and more aggressive once food is detected. The unprovoked attacks are the when the animal attacks the person thinking as prey. These attacks are the consequence of diseases, or involve an animal wanting right of way as a form of interference competition between carnivores and people. In such instances, the animal and the person are intent on using the same space and the animal attacks when it is not given the right of way and the person is not able to scare off the attacking animal.

Find the co-existence

Human-Wildlife conflict is a major issue in conservation. As long people encroach into natural habitats, and modify it as they require, the contact between people and wild animals will stay long. We have hardly 4% of the land left for wildlife conservation in the form of protected area or reserves, but animals are present even outside these areas. Co-existence in this environment is a biggest challenge in this developing world with threats of mining, roads, making the land fragmented each day.  People die of with cancer, road accidents; do we shun those things which cause this? No, then why we need to shun the wildlife which cause little harm and provide in numerable benefits to us, can’t we provide some space for them rather than getting into serious conflict with this creatures. We use wildlife for our recreational, ecological and many other needs, but when it comes to providing a space and living with them they are problem for us and want to shun them.

First and the principle threat which needs to be addressed are habitat fragmentation and degradation of forested lands. Secondly, illegal hunting of wild herbivores, which is depleting the herbivore populations and driving carnivore out in search of food. Thirdly to minimize the use of forest for grazing and collection of the forest products, this will facilitate food for wild herbivores. Fourthly in case of leopards, due to large amount of garbage disposal which increases the population of feral animals feeding on it, this attracts it. This must be addressed and effectively managed to avoid interactions further with humans. Fifth is the illegal trade in wildlife which needs to be addressed and abolished from the system which is taking away our wildlife. And lastly people need to recognize the importance of wildlife for the survival in this planet earth which can be achieved with the goodwill of the people.