Sandra Albert and Glenn C Kharkongor recount their bird-watching experience
A TEAM of 13 scientists, staff and students from Martin Luther Christian University recently under¬took a survey in Balpakram National Park to study the flora, especial¬ly medicinal plants, bird species and the tourism potential of the area.
Balpakram, located in the South Garo Hillls of Meghalaya has forested hills, grassy plateaus and deep canyons, now part of a National Park set up in 1987. It is 62 km from Baghmara, the district headquarters, and 167 km from the nearest major town, Tura. The southern part of the park borders the international boundary between India and Bangladesh. The total area is 352 sq km and the cen¬tral plateau is 797m (2831 ft) above sea level. From this plateau, several rivers originate and have cut deep gorges and canyons in various directions. The Mahadeo River has creat-ed one such spectacular canyon.
The literal meaning of Balpakram is the ‘land of perpetual winds’. Balpakram occupies a dis¬tinct place in the lore, leg¬ends and beliefs of the Garos. In a booklet by Helsingh A Marak, he says, “when a person dies, his or her immortal spirit journeys to Balpakram, there to stay for a time, and then reaches out to the infinite, serene, happy spirit spheres in the Great Beyond to remain there until higher powers direct its rebirth. To the Garos, without Balpakram, the traditional belief in rebirth is unthinkable. Balpakram has a place in the Kata Agona, the epic lore of the Garos.”
Balpakram is rich in biodiversity and known for its rare flora and fauna and marine fossils. It has a
remnant population of the endangered wild water buffalo and a small popu¬lation of the red panda. It is also an important habitat and corridor of the Asian elephant and the gaur or Indian bison. There are eight species of cats, in¬cluding the tiger, clouded leopard, marbled cat and golden cat. Balpakram has a diverse primate popula¬tion of seven species. The stump-tailed macaque is rarely seen, but the pig-tailed macaque is often en¬countered. The hoolock gibbon is well distributed all over the park except for
letter marks in all subjects except one. The ‘always regular student’, as her principal Sudipta Hore puts it, was also helped by an American trust with fi¬nances.
“I faced difficulties in pursuing my studies since it is not possible for my father to fund my studies and maintain the family at the same time,” said Rabina. Hore said that the Deepa Memorial Trust
for the grassy plateaus. Other mammals include the serow, black bear, slow loris, wild dog, bark¬ing deer, pangolin, giant black squirrel and the fly¬ing squirrel.
The Park is rich in flora, especially medicinal plants and rare and en¬demic insectivorous plants like the giant pitcher plant and sundew plant. Sanjeevani, locally known as sampanngi, is the magi¬cal medicinal plant of the Ramayana, believed to have been carried from here by Hanuman to save the injured Lakshman. According to local lore, an old Garo woman told Hanuman the secret loca¬tion of the plant, giving him a dry fish to aid his search. She told him to carry it in his hand, saying that as he neared the plant, the fish would come to life. Hanuman became so hungry during his forays in the forest that he ate the dry fish. Not able to find the plant, he gouged out the entire hill. This is de¬picted in the common pic¬ture of Hanuman carrying a hill in his hand.
Balpakram is an Important Bird Area (IBA), classified as such by the Indian Bird Conservation Network, Bombay Natural History Society and Birdlife International. Eight forest types have been identified in this IBA: tropical ever¬green forest on the gorges and steep slopes; tropical semi-evergreen or mixed evergreen forest in depres-sions on the plateau and surrounded by grassland or secondary forest; river¬ine forest in areas subject to periodic inundation; grassland and tree savan¬nah confined to Rongcheng and Lumsorjong areas and maintained through browsing and burning; tropical deciduous forest, which is a successional type and man-made forest; bamboo forest and second¬ary formations in areas of shifting cultivation. A small lake called
Goirapathal in the park and the riverbanks provide habitats for flocks of mi¬gratory ducks and endem¬ic fish owls.
The website of the Indian Bird Conservation Network estimates that there are about 250 bird species in this IBA.The website of the Samrakshan Trust which focuses on community-based ele¬phant conservation lists 292 birds seen in the South Garo Hills. This list has been compiled from multiple individual sight¬ings and unpublished re¬ports.
In April this year, we undertook a three-day bird survey at Balpakram. We were joined by ShishirSaxena and John Christo, members of the BNG Birds Group of Bangalore. The four team members are amateur bird watchers, whose bird watching experiencesin-clude participation in bird clubs and bird races.
The bird watching was done mainly in the early to mid-morning and then in the late afternoon and evening and covered the areas in and around the park, near the forest guest house and on the banks of the Mahadeo River.
Two members of the team conducted a band transect count to enumerate the frequency of bird species encoun¬tered. The analysis of this data will provide a baseline from which bird density and endangerment can be evalu¬ated.
We saw 126 bird species during the trip. These in¬cluded birds in the part of Assam close to the Garo Hills and in and around Tura, where we halted enroute. The total number of bird species seen in the Balpakram area was 92.The team members saw 25-30 ‘lifers’ each, the birding term for species seen for the first time by a per¬son.
The Balpakram area is one of the richest biodiversity spots in the Eastern Himalayas. One of the six major ele¬phant corridors in Meghalaya is the Baghmara-Balpakram Corridor,which is 6km long and 4.5 km wide. The principal threat to wildlife in the area arises from large scale conversion of land use to monoculture cash crops such as cashew, areca nut, rubber, tea, fruits and
spices. Such conversion permanently banishes forests and drastically reduces habitats for animals and birds. Other threats are coal and limestone mining in the near¬by areas, plans to a build a dam on the Simsang River, poaching and trapping, firewood collection, livestock grazing and insurgency activity.
We observed extensive burning insideBalpakram Park and the contiguous areas. Habitation and cultivation are not permitted inside the park, but according to the people who live in the area, unknown individuals enter the park frequently and are responsible for the fires. Some fires were still alive, progressively damaging the habitat of animals and birds. There were hardly any fruit or flower¬ing trees on the plateau and neither small birds nor rap¬tors were observed in the park. According to the local people, there used to be thousands of vultures, roosting and nesting at a place called SoginSaram in the park. We did not see a single vulture.Two threatened species have habitats in Balpakram, the White Winged Duck) and the
Oriental White Rumped Vulture. Hornbills are also a threatened species of which we sighted one species, the asian pied hornbill.
Some of the noteworthy birds we sighted included a variety of colourful pigeons such as the emerald green pigeon, yellow footed green pigeon, thick billed pigeon and wedge tailed pigeon. Other interesting species sight¬ed were the asian fairy bluebirds, red headed trogons, green billed malkohas, little spider hunters, great barbets, blue throated barbets, necklace laughing thrushes and several woodpecker species. We were relieved to see hill mynas, a species that probably abounded in Shillong in times past but hardly observed nowadays (except for the lone caged pair in Lady Hydari Park!
Fortunately, civil society groups like the Samrakshan Trust have initiated community-based efforts at conser¬vation and their strategies include working with elders and school children.
At after school sessions, children are given materials to make posters of birds and animals they have seen and take them home to discuss with their parents. Much more needs to be done to document and conserve the fragile biodiversity of Balpakram. ■