Man attacked and taken by a Tiger

Some of you may have heard this story, others may not have but it still holds an important message.

A few weeks ago a man, Sushil Manjhi, was fishing for crabs with his 2 children in the Sundarbans National Park when a Bengal Tiger leapt out and grasped the man in his jaws shaking him furiously before disappearing with the body into the mangrove swamp. The two 
children had tried to beat the tiger with sticks and a knife to no avail and the man was presumed dead.

Although this story is a sad one it is not uncommon, with this being the 4th tiger assault this year alone. Fishing in the national park is in fact illegal yet, because these crabs and other forest goods make good money at market, people risk their lives to enter the forest and fish in the rivers. In India, poverty is a national problem and it is the prospect of earning good money to feed their families which arrives individuals to run such risks.

With such a huge human population in India that continues to grow, conflict is likely to increase due to habitat reduction for the tigers,  as more and more people move into where the tigers were once able to roam freely. The National Park, where the attack happened is one of the largest reserves for the Bengal Tiger species with India having half of the global Bengal Tiger population which is sadly decreasing due to the despicable demand for tiger organs and bones in Chinese medicine.

This attack just shows how powerless humans really are against these animals who are only acting upon natural instincts to survive. It is humans that are entering the tiger's territory and as tiger habitat decreases, it is the national parks which will become crucial for the species survival.

These species deserve to survive and live away from humans, but, is the human race too selfish to care about other species ahead of their own? Although this attack may not seem large in the scale of things, it is the beginning of a major problem, if the human population keeps on growing  at the current rate, where are these people are going to live, and find work without causing conflict with the tigers. I guess only time will tell, all we can be certain of is this sadly won't be the last tiger attack in the Sunderbans National Park.

Safe haven for Scottish wildcat!

A new designated wildcat sanctuary has been placed in a remote location on the Ardnamurchan peninsula, which is located in the north west Highlands, Scottland, in the hope to be able to preserve the species.

Scottish wildcats numbers have dramatically reduced as they are able to mate with domestic cats and so, diluting the pure bred wildcat genes. This problem, along with habitat destruction and disease has now placed the species on the brink of extinction in the wild.

The new sanctuaries rural location means that the likelihood of domestic and wildcats mixing is very slim and all domestic cats, especially the feral individuals is the surrounding areas are being neutered to reduce the chance again.This is the first time feral cats have been controlled in a large area and it is likely that the population with die off in a few years preventing any cross breeding that would be detrimental to the project. The number of wildcats left in the wild is not known and could be as low as 35 which makes this project even more important to the species survival.

Let hope that this new plan allows wildcat numbers to increase and enables the species to be brought back from the brink of extinction in the wild. To help support or donate to this amazing project, please click on the first link below, their website also has loads more information about the area and the work underway.

To read more...
http://www.wildcathaven.co.uk/
http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/environment/haven-to-save-the-wildcat-from-total-extinction.24748248
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-28315555

Field Course Fun

A few weeks ago I was on my last module of the year, a field course at the National Trust's Malham Tarn. Field courses that I had previously been on were been exhusting! Trying to cram in a huge volume of work into a week is always going to be tough but this time instead of it feeling super stressful the whole week was thoroughly enjoyable!

A view of Malham Tarn

After the 5km walk from the centre of Malham to where we were staying, the large National Trust house, we all arrived a little low in energy. After a short break and food we were split into our project groups which had been decided back in May, and, after discussing what we wanted to do with our supervisor we were allowed to relax.

I worked on bat emergence and following behaviour whilst on the field course which meant that the group I was in had to spend an hour our so out from sunset to count how many bats emerged and at what time. We also looked at if bats emerged closely together and if they did, did they follow each other. Although other projects appeared to be a little more time consuming in terms of data collection, I felt like the huge numbers of midgey bites I obtained made up for it.

In the days we had mini projects that we had to do over the course of the week and it was our choice how we decided to distribute our time. The projects included identifying tree species, observing birds and using coordinates to identify specific flowers. It was the mini tasks which enabled us to really get involved with what we were doing and learn so much more than if we had just been forced to write a report. This was because you were finding out things independently.

Along with all work that we had to do we got to take part in bird and bat netting, allowing us to catch the species and examine them closely which was incredible.

A baby bluetit

The entire field course enabled us to learn so much whilst specialising in things that we found interesting which meant you always put all your effort into the activities. Sadly we didn't get to go caving as the weather was to unpredictable but we did get to take part in a treasure hunt, in which my team came second after a HUGE amount of running around.

On the last day we all had to give our presentations about  our mini projects which was a little daunting but a great experience and then we got to have a fun quiz on pointless information.

Over all this was without doubt the best field course I have gone on so far and would recommend it to anyone at Leeds who is debating going on it!

The field course members