The foggy morning had given approach to an excellent solar. Regardless of the coolness within the air, I might really feel sweat beginning to bead down my neck as my discipline assistant and I made our approach to a waterhole within the Kanha Tiger Reserve. It was December 2019, and I had simply began the fieldwork element of my MSc mission. I wished to determine and study spatial and temporal patterns in how wild ungulates in Kanha used waterholes: when and the place the animals most well-liked to drink water. The majority of my knowledge was collected utilizing digital camera traps.
Strolling by the jungle, I used to be excited. Simply two weeks earlier than, I had arrange my first batch of digital camera traps. My plan that day was to retrieve them and see what I had discovered. For a younger researcher like me, it felt like I used to be strolling in direction of buried treasure.
Digital camera traps, or path cameras, sometimes encompass a digital camera unit together with a movement sensor. They are often calibrated to take a set variety of images or document movies at any time when motion is detected. As soon as put in, they’re able to passively accumulating timestamped data of wildlife presence in a non-intrusive method. For my mission, I wanted to know which species have been visiting waterholes for a interval of no less than two weeks.
Organising a digital camera entice at a watering gap.
Picture Credit score: Tara Rajendran
Upon reaching the waterhole, I used to be relieved to see that my digital camera traps have been intact and kind of pointing in the identical route I had left them in. I’ve typically been requested whether or not animals discover the digital camera traps. The system itself is sufficiently small to carry in a single hand. Whereas older fashions are normally geared up with a flash for nighttime, many more and more function an array of Infrared LEDs which emit no seen mild.
The system is stationary and operates silently. It’s fairly cheap to imagine that they might go unnoticed by animals. Over the course of my fieldwork, although, I discovered that this was not often the case.
Most animals seem to grasp when a digital camera entice has been set. The grownup ungulates, specifically chital, sambar, barasingha, and wild boar normally got here shut for a cursory sniff, after which they ignored the traps. The preliminary inspection normally yielded hilarious selfies, with solely a watch, ear or antler seen. The carnivores nearly all the time got here and spent a couple of minutes sniffing across the traps.
Right here I’m pretending to be a tiger as a way to make certain the digital camera entice was working. I later went and checked the digital camera entice to confirm that images have been being taken as anticipated.
Picture Credit score: Tara Rajendran
One enterprising tigress thought it was a good suggestion to scent-mark one among my digital camera traps. As I used to be going by the picture data, I might see her strategy and rub her cheek towards the entice, after which she proceeded to liberally spray her urine throughout my entice. Evidently, the subsequent few images have been extraordinarily blurry!
In contrast to their elders, who have been glad with a number of curious sniffs, tiger cubs engaged in a extra thorough inspection by nudging, poking, pushing and even gnawing on the traps. They as soon as chewed up a strap and left the digital camera entice fully tilted and barely connected to its publish.
However the species which gave me probably the most hassle throughout fieldwork was a species I used to be not even finding out, the langur. I discovered that langur troops normally frequented waterholes round midday.
Deep contained in the forest, these small swimming pools offered a cool respite from the scorching noontime warmth. A troop would keep at a waterhole wherever between one to 2 hours, with the adults unfold out, resting, grooming and sometimes ingesting. Throughout this time, the juveniles would play. Their toys of selection, in fact, have been my poor digital camera traps.
A tigress and her cubs having a midnight drink. This digital camera entice had an array of infrared LEDs for nighttime images. Regardless of not emitting any seen mild, the entice makes a faint whirring noise when a photograph is taken and that may very well be what the tigers are taking a look at.
Picture Credit score: Tara Rajendran
At bigger waterholes, the cameras have been positioned all alongside the perimeter. This meant that, in lots of images, a number of digital camera traps have been seen secured to picket posts. This setup additionally gave me photographic proof of the sheer period of time the langurs spent fidgeting with the digital camera traps. Monkeys actually know the best way to strategy an issue from all angles.
I’ve images of them peering into the digital camera entice from the entrance and sideways, and even climbing on high of the picket posts simply to bend over and study the entice from that angle. I used to drag the straps so tight that my arms have been rubbed uncooked, however, simply by sheer persistence, they managed to dislodge many a entice, even fully untying a number of.
Out of all of the animals who inadvertently dislodged my digital camera traps, solely wild boars have my sympathy. Whereas going by some footage recorded in the course of the preliminary phases of my mission, I discovered a video the place there have been no animals to be seen, however the digital camera was swaying gently back and forth.
The thriller was unexpectedly solved a number of days later when, whereas on discipline, I noticed a wild boar having fun with a protracted leisurely scratch by rubbing itself towards the canvas straps wound all alongside the picket publish.
A few gaur (Indian bison) inspecting the digital camera entice.
Picture Credit score: Tara Rajendran
Regardless of the good images and humorous tales that have been an inevitable results of wildlife interacting with the traps, there was all the time an opportunity of dropping knowledge. The forest guards at Kanha have been my guardian angels on this regard. They used to accompany me on my periodic visits to completely different waterholes and have been greater than prepared to maintain a watch out for any displaced digital camera traps whereas out on patrol. Many instances, they requested me in regards to the numerous doable settings and have been curious in regards to the ensuing images.
After I began my fieldwork, my high concern was ensuring I had sufficient knowledge. In my head, I had a tough plan of the process to comply with. I knew that the images needed to be organised in a selected method, and every picture needed to be tagged with all of the completely different species current in it. What I had not anticipated was the sheer quantity of images. By the top of my fieldwork, I had amassed over 1.5 lakh images.
In sheer panic on the quantity of unanticipated work, I spent all my free time tagging images over countless cups of tea on the native dhaba. By the top of my third cup, there would normally be a crowd of curious onlookers gathered round to look at. Regardless of my steady efforts, I used to be unable to maintain up with the sheer quantity of images pouring in.
On this state of panic, I recruited my dad and mom and fiancé as unpaid labor. I offered them a crash course in figuring out ungulates and utilizing the tagging software program. It was by their relentless efforts that I used to be in a position to keep on schedule. I solely realized how far we had all come after I overheard my dad and mom, fully of their very own curiosity, focus on the ingesting habits of the barasingha!
It seems to be like this chital is saying “Yikes! we’re being watched!”
Picture Credit score: Tara Rajendran
Tara Rajendran forayed into the sector of wildlife and ecology after she was bored by the unchanging lifetime of an IT skilled. After having fun with the great campus life at NCBS which challenged her mental and bodily capabilities, she just lately wrapped up a 12 months lengthy mission at WWF India. A number of the most memorable moments of her life are from her fieldwork days spent within the forests of central India. She hopes to get extra writing carried out throughout lockdown.
This sequence is an initiative by the Nature Conservation Basis, below their programme Nature Communication to encourage nature content material in all Indian languages. Should you’re concerned with writing on nature and birds, please replenish this form.
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