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The wild buffalo
is one such species that is extremely threatened and yet
no efforts have been made towards the conservation of
this majestic animal. Buffaloes constitute the world's
largest domesticated cattle population.
But its wild counterpart, the wild water buffalo, is on
the verge of extinction. The wild water buffalo resembles
the domestic buffalo and because it is not an exotic looking
animal, it doesn’t attract popular attention. These
animals were once found in abundance in Nepal-Terai belt,
vast tracts of the Bastar forest, adjacent Chattisgarh
and Orissa and in the North-East (Upper Brahmaputra region).
Government policy has worked against the wild buffalo.
It chose to give away grasslands for agricultural purposes
and as part of land distribution programs, thus prioritizing
forest areas over the natural habitat of these animals.
This has forced them to change their behaviour patterns
in order to survive.
The wild buffaloes are adapted to grasslands of medium
height, areas where there is access to water, marshes
and wetlands. The kind of grass that they feed on needs
alluvial soil and the same soil is best suited for agricultural
purposes. Now that almost all the alluvial land has been
converted into croplands, it has resulted in a loss of
habitat for these animals. They have been forced to retreat
to less suitable areas like reserve forest with grasslands,
etc. In the night, they travel long distances for food,
which adversely affects their health. Buffaloes generally
feed during the day but because of human intervention,
they prefer going to their feeding grounds at night and
have therefore become nocturnal animals.
The wild buffalo would very often drive the domesticated
buffalo herds into the wild, so there were retribution
or anger killings. The villagers took pot shots at the
very sight of a wild buffalo in order to protect their
cattle. Poaching was also a major cause of decline of
its population. For an average person the meat of wild
buffalo is not that palatable but for tribals it’s
a delicacy. In the Bastar region, “Parath”
or community hunting takes place where after setting fire
to the grassland, these buffaloes are trapped in a net,
and then killed with spears. These repeated fires also
harden up the soil and the grasslands are converted to
forests.
When we look at the domestic buffalo of Northeast we see
that there is evidence of interbreeding amongst the wild
and the domestic buffalo. The Northeast domestic buffalo
is bigger than a normal domestic buffalo and wilder in
its appearance and behavior. They even give less milk.
When the wild buffalo mates with the female domestic buffalo,
this often results in the death of the female. Even if
she survives, 6-7 fetus out of 10 die at the time of birth
due to the large size of the fetus. In Chattisgarh, the
ratio is even worse. In Bastar region the purity was retained
because the tribals used to rear cows to avoid losing
their cattle. This was because once the wild buffalo comes
to mate with the domestic buffalo, it kills the prime
buffalo and takes the whole herd with it. In Manas earlier
there was periphery interbreeding but now the breeding
is deep inside the sanctuary. Other reasons for their
decline include floods in wildlife reserved areas like
Kaziranga, competition for forage and vulnerability to
diseases of domesticated buffaloes like rinderpest, etc.
The wild buffalo are now forced to inhabit areas protected
for tigers, which are not their original habitat and have
already been encroached by humans. No specific efforts
have been targeted at them to protect their habitat as
well as to prevent poaching and interbreeding.
When we think of conserving bio-diversity we tend to think
in terms of saving forests, and ignore other habitats
in the eco-system. It seems that the fate of these animals
is restricted to forests and reserved areas. Forests and
reserved areas truly seem to be the last place where nature
gets a chance to survive. Earlier these forests were full
of life and now government is submitting to the needs
of local people by allowing them to use the forest resources.
Earlier this was restricted to bona fide use like utilisation
for personal use, but now that there is no such restriction;
the limit is as much as one can collect. Hence, it is
essential to make these habitats a land of no use, from
a land of partial or multiple use. Only in a land where
there is minimum human intervention will nature bloom
in its full vigour. These awesome creations of God can
also have a right to inhabit their original habitat. They
are a part of our biodiversity, having their own importance
in the eco-system. They should not be dismissed and ignored
just because they are buffaloes. |
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Wild
Buffaloes 
