The future of wolves in vanishing grasslands

In January this year, the dry grasslands of Bankapur came alive with the yips of new life — a litter of Indian wolf pups, born inside Karnataka’s only dedicated wolf sanctuary. The news triggered cautious celebration. But the deeper question is, what comes next? Can Karnataka become more than just a rare pocket of survival for wolves?

India’s grey wolves (Canis lupus pallipes) have an ancient lineage. Genetic studies suggest they split from other wolves nearly 400,000 years ago, long before modern humans. They are ghosts of the subcontinent’s grasslands, shaped not by snow and conifers like their western counterparts, but by thorn scrub, rolling savannas, and semi-arid plains. They have long existed in the shadow of India’s larger predators — tigers, lions, and leopards.

On October 10, 2025, a global panel from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) finally classified the Indian wolf as a potentially distinct species. It designated it as ‘vulnerable’, elevating the urgency of conserving it.

According to a 2023 Wildlife Institute of India study, there are an estimated 2,400–3,100 wolves left in the country. Karnataka holds a small but crucial share of this population, spread across Koppal, Gadag, Bagalkot, Chitradurga, and Haveri. 

“As a child in the 1960s, I used to see wolves often. By the time I returned to the grasslands in 2014, I had not seen one for 30 years when I chanced upon a lone wolf close to home. This gave me hope — that somehow they had survived,” recalls Indrajeet Ghorpade, a wildlife photographer and conservationist from north Karnataka.

Driven by the idea that wolves were still in the vicinity, Ghorpade founded the Deccan Conservation Foundation and partnered with researchers such as Iravatee Majgaonkar to map wolf habitats across Koppal and neighbouring districts. Their work led to the recognition of Bankapur as a breeding site and, subsequently, the creation of the 332-hectare Bankapur Wolf Sanctuary by the state government.

“For me, Bankapur was like a maternity ward that had to be protected,” Ghorpade says. The Forest Department fenced the area, reduced human interference, and initiated awareness drives among nearby villages to protect the caves where wolves were giving birth to the next generation.

However, a single sanctuary is not the solution, feels Ghorpade. Its rocky outcrops and grassy patches may offer temporary refuge to a handful of packs. Yet, the future of wolves in Karnataka — and across India — depends on what happens outside protected zones.

Protecting grasslands

Iravatee Majgaonkar, a PhD student at ATREE, says the key to wolf conservation lies in reimagining conservation itself.

“Indian wolves are largely found in human-dominated landscapes — a mix of rocky outcrops, grasslands, and rainfed agriculture,” she explains. “Sanctuaries can support a few packs, but long-term survival depends on maintaining populations outside these protected areas.”

For decades, India’s conservation policies focused almost exclusively on forests. However, about 10% of India’s landmass consists of Open Natural Ecosystems — landscapes with a dry climate, low tree cover, and short vegetation. The absence of trees is not a flaw, but the essence of this ecosystem.

“Protected areas have a forest bias,” Majgaonkar notes. Indian wolves, striped hyenas, blackbucks, foxes, jackals, and the rare Great Indian Bustard inhabit the opposite of forests — the dry, treeless expanses of grassland and scrub.

“Free-ranging dog populations are in direct competition for food and space. There are sporadic retaliatory killings that go unreported. But the largest impact comes from land-use change — agricultural expansion, industrial projects, and so-called greening drives involving tree plantations,” says Majgaonkar, whose research delves into coexistence between wildlife, pastoralists, and farmers. 

Projects such as the Hesaraghatta grasslands plantation drive by the Bangalore Development Authority — which led to campaigns and eventually the state government’s notification to declare it as Greater Hesaraghatta Grassland Conservation Reserve — show how grasslands are wrongly assumed to be barren lands that must be ‘turned green’. 

Lessons to learn

In Gujarat, wolves bred in captivity, trained and re-wilded under a monitored programme, produced their first wild pup a couple of months ago. It showed what sustained, science-backed intervention can achieve when paired with local involvement.

In Jharkhand’s Mahuadanr Sanctuary, local tribals avoid entering the Sal forests during winter, giving wolves time to den and procreate peacefully. Coexistence for them is a natural way of life.  

Ghorpade points to similar sentiments among the Kuruba nomadic graziers of Karnataka. The pastoral community is not anguished when wolves lift diseased sheep from their herds and see it as nature’s culling system. 

Any conservation effort must begin with locals, feels Ghorpade. “You can’t fence out a species that has lived alongside shepherds for centuries,” he says. “You have to make the wolf part of the village story again through education, fair compensation, and pride.”

If Karnataka wants to secure a future for its wolves, it must look beyond enclosures and sanctuaries. It must invest in community partnerships, dog population control, habitat connectivity, and grassland restoration policies that value the open lands wolves inhabit.

As Ghorpade puts it, “Grassland restoration isn’t just about wolves. It brings back blackbuck, bustards, and countless smaller species that depend on the same ecosystem. The wolf becomes an umbrella — if it thrives, so does everything else.”

(The author is a science and environment writer who works on endangered species and biodiversity conservation)