Wild beyond the stripes

‘Awarded for Excellence (to) Kaziranga Tiger Reserve in recognition of outstanding performance in the field of conservation of species other than tigers in tiger reserves’ reads a prominently displayed National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) plaque, greeting us at the forest guest house on the outskirts of the national park.

The famed one-horned rhinoceros had already been ticked off the bucket list, as we sighted a few while traversing the animal corridor in the buffer zone itself. The stout, well-built creatures, quite like the “biological armoured tanks” now endemic to the region, once spanned the entire Indo-Gangetic plains as described by Mughal emperor Babur in his waqai (memoirs), popularly known as Baburnama. The ash-coloured, solitary mammals, along with the other heavy-duty herbivores, the elephants and the bison, are quite easy to spot.

But not so the Royal Bengal Tiger. The tall, dried elephant grass provides the lethal camouflage for the apex predator to make a kill. The elusive cat gave us a slip a few times as we trailed fresh pug marks, fresh scratches on trees, a deer’s persistent call and other visitors reporting sightings “just around the corner”, while the “unlucky” ones, at one point, got caught between two tuskers on opposite ends, with one charging at us for disrupting his mud bath!

Indian golden orioles flashing their bright yellows escorted us into the sanctuary after the security checks. The grasslands in the buffer zone soon transitioned into woodlands in the core, revealing the rich biodiversity. A tree hole nestled a strikingly patterned rock python, while a perfectly camouflaged Bengal monitor lizard craned its neck out from another opening, perhaps trying to catch some sunshine. A flashy jungle fowl here, a drab bearded shrike there, vibrant kingfishers and Indian rollers, colour-blocked pheasants, and fork-tailed metallic black drongos all made for the vivid avian life around. A slender-billed vulture sat guarding its nest high up on a tree. Cormorants played “statue-statue” over water bodies, perhaps stealthily waiting for a scrumptious catch. A grey-headed fish eagle made an unsuccessful dive at catching a fish, leaving its prey injured and writhing in the waters. Hordes of Great White Pelicans with distinctively pouched beaks, black-necked storks, oriental darters, and tortoises sunbathed around water bodies. Prey species like hog deer, swamp deer, boars and hogs were aplenty.

There’s more to wildlife than tigers and rhinos in Kaziranga, as it is elsewhere. Though, we finally did spot a rare golden tiger, an albino because of inbreeding, endemic to Kaziranga, only three of its kind in the world, its fiery orange coat marked with golden stripes glistening in the fading rays of the setting sun after much chase. Being on top of the food pyramid, the big cat matters, after all.