Live from the Indian Jungles

Little Big Cat strikes again!

It was in the month of November last year, i had for the very first time set up my camara trap at the resort property and for my luck, the Leopard chose to take the same path that night! It was the same day that the constructions workers also started their work, so i felt that the leopard would not pass again.Many camera nights passed by, I got the smallest of all wild cat – Rusty Spotted Cat, Civet Cat, Mongoose & few birds, but not the Leopard. Two months later, I could smell a strong Scent mark of a large cat in one of the small trails. "Ok! so it is visiting occasionally", I thought. To add to the signs, a few weeks later, I found a very old scat on a trail at the edge of the property bordering a sugarcane field.
From last two months, a small village settlement close to us which has sugarcane fields, were reporting of finding pugmarks of a possible Leopard in the fields & they had reported the same to the Forest Department. Later in mid last month, i.e. April, late evening at 7pm I got information that a Leopard had been sighted at Kabini Foundation which is situated between our place and the main village. I rushed there with powerful flashlight but was not able see, 2 hrs later Shivappa who was going back to his house with another villager saw the leopard close to the village.

Our Property is not directly connected with the forest, which may be less than 4kms as the bird flies. However, they are all covered by Agricultural fields and these fields are cultivated seasonally & others which are grown through out the year are sugarcanes as they have water pumps. The boundaries of these fields are with thick Lantana & other thorny bushes, which makes ideal home for Wild boars, hares, civets, mongooses & of course to our Leopard.

There is pleanty of space for the leopard, so it is living in and around the resort for quite sometime. But what is it surviving on ?? The first thing came to my mind was Village dogs which are in plenty. This was confirmed yesterday!

It rained heavily day before evening for a few hours & in the early hours of the darkness, the Leopard had made a kill - A black dog from the village just a km from our property that too someone's Pet! It dragged it all the way from there to our place through the ploughed fields & to the mud road & again on an open dry field & finally into the bamboos. Here it left the kill half eaten, it had finished only the stomach. One of our staff coming early morning saw the pugmarks & the drag mark & informed me and the other people. Before I went to check, they had followed the drag and had found the kill.
"It was 12'o clock now, so I guessed it had made a kill early in the morning as it had eaten only the stomach part & left, so it will come back to night", i thought. I knew it is hiding in the sugarcane field or in our property itself. I thought of setting up the camera trap at 3 pm, as i still had to charge the batteries. Also the people were talking aloud, so i thought that the leopard would not return just as yet. We left & I told every on not come here again as I was going to set up the camera.
At 3 pm I went to the spot carrying the trap with my friend to find the carcass was missing! I was totally surprised ! I couldn't believe that the leopard had come after we left & taken the kill! I could not find the kill as it had lifted it completely & disappeared. I searched around to find small heaps of dried leaf litter scraped up. Initially I thought it's a left over kill covered by the leopard, but usually the Tiger's do that. When I opened it , it had old scats & a small bones! So, its clear that this leopard is making regular kill and eating it here. I set up the trap in front of those heaps as I thought it may come to scent mark. i checked today morning but I found nothing other than a wild boar pic. Close to it i found the black fur of the dog but nothing else. So I left the Camera Trap near by to try my luck. While coming back Byra who was accompanying asked 'Sir, if it's around one day it may attack & eat us? Isn't it?'. So I said' don't worry Byra they wont eat Junk Food!'.