More at http://www.sanctuaryasia.com | Perspective
It was 4:00 a.m. or earlier perhaps.
Waking to a cup of hot milk, I found
myself wrapped in a cozy bundle in my
mother’s lap in the front seat of an open
four-wheel drive Gypsy. My dad was
in the driver’s seat and the cold desert
wind slapped us in our faces, causing our
eyes to water. I have vivid memories of
a childhood spent in Kutchh – a dome-
FACING PAGE Seen here is Harshini assisting
her father Dr. Yadvendradev V. Jhala and his
team to document data during a lion-collaring
exercise at the Gir National Park in 2014.shaped piece of land in northwest India
cut off from the rest of the mainland
by the Little and the Great Rann of
Kutchh. My father and his research team
at the Wildlife Institute of India were
studying the ecology of the endangered
Indian wolf. First the car wound around
what looked like a ghost village cloaked
under the spell of timelessness. Even theferal dogs busy howling last night were
nowhere around.
As we left the village behind I found
myself wondering: “Was something
caught! Or were last evening’s eff orts
futile?” We parked the vehicle a distance
away from where a rubber-padded jaw
trap, designed not to hurt an animal, had
been laid from where my father surveyed
the scene through his fi eld glasses. There
was something in that trap. We moved
to the trap site quickly, but quietly,
with my father insistent that no sudden
movement be made that might cause any
distress to the trapped animal.
“Anything but a village dog,” I said to
myself, though we hoped it was a wolf
hyaena, or jackal.
It was a wolf!THE INDIAN WOLF
An animal with a sleek and slender body;
perfect for surviving in this harsh arid
environment, the wolf is known to prey
upon smaller animals such as rodents,
gazelle, and hare, but is quite capable of
hunting down larger prey including nilgai,
wild pig and blackbuck. But in Kutchh, the
wolf’s main prey were sheep and goats,
which brings the handsome carnivores
into confl ict with people. Given the lack
of prey, wolf pack-sizes in Kutchh are
particularly small, usually between two to
eight. There is a seasonal variation in their
coats... thin in summer, thick in winter.
Wolves have always fascinated me.
They carry an aura of mystery hidden in
their amber eyes. The one we saw in that
trap, however, looked kind of sad and I
longed to see him quickly set free.
The dart gun was loaded, a concoction
of drugs prepared and the shot fi red by
my father found the shoulder muscle. I
began to count backwards. It usually took
fi ve to eight minutes for the anaesthesia
to work. I had been part of this routine
often. Once the animal was down, the real
work began; a radio transmitter had to
be fi tted, blood, hair and parasite samples
taken, the trapped foot massaged with
an antiseptic cream. This accomplished,
the animal was aged from its dentition.
The shape and length of canines revealed
the age with younger animals sporting