Wildlife volunteering.. a week of jungle walking with the Center for Wildlife Studies

The way the survey works is something like this. Basically the entire area to be surveyed is divided into many square grids called Transects. And our job as surveyors is to walk along the lines of these Transects and note down the direction and distance of any wild animal that we spot. The CWS people will then use this information to create a distribution model of the various species in the area and come up with approximate numbers of their population. The length of each of these transects in Anshi-Dandeli was 4km. The lines of the Transects are straight as an arrow and they cut through the terrain regardless of its difficulties. So over the course of the 4km you might find yourself scrambling up & down steep hillsides, traversing rock faces, negotiating dense thorny undergrowth, skirting around fields, wading through streams and even rowing a boat across lakes… doing all this while keeping a lookout for any wild animals which might not be so thrilled to see you. 

Hindsight does make you look wise. 

I had no clue about these difficulties when i started out and was under the impression that walking the 4km transects would be akin to, say, taking a walk in the park. So naturally i didn't hesitate when the camp organizer asked me if i could start with a tough transect.

On my first 'walking' day, we left camp at around 5:45am and i had loads of fun driving the camp jeep on the dirt tracks leading up to our transect. Once we reached the drop off point there was a 1.5km hike straight up a hillside to reach our start point. I managed that without much difficulty. From the start point the line plunged down for about 500m and this is where my troubles began. The shoes i was wearing were a little small for my feet and although they work nicely when going uphill, they murder my toes when walking downhill. The pain started slowly at first.. but pretty soon it got excruciating, as if my toes were placed in-between a vise whose screws were tightened every time i put my foot down. Needless to say my going was painfully slow and it took me over 5 hours to complete the 4km + 3km distance. Walk in the park ??? not by any stretch of the imagination. As I'm typing this both my big toes are black with blood clots.

Mercifully i got the next day off and one of the local camp staff offered to exchange shoes with me. We had the exact opposite problems. While my shoes were a bit small, his were a bit large and as a result his toes would painfully strike the front of the shoe every time he walked downhill. We tried swapping shoes and remarkably it was a good fit for the both of us.

If the first outing was all about my shoes, the second one was about my fitness, the general lack of it. I got the notoriously tough Kundal line and walking it was like riding a sine wave. Straight up for 300m and straight down for the next 300m.. up and down, up and down until the last 500m. The inclines were such that we had to use both our arms and legs to propel up or slide down the slopes. It was in one of these slopes that i slipped and slid down with my left leg twisted backwards dragging down on my knee. For a moment i was scared that i might've done some serious damage to my knee but luckily it just bled a little with no other damage. From then on my confidence was low and my footing unsure and i basically trudged my way to the end point much to the annoyance of my walking partner. The 4km route took over 4 hours for me to negotiate.

Luckily both my walks happened in the morning. The evening walks start around 4:00pm which means that you basically have abut 2.5 hours to complete the line or risk walking the jungle in the dark. My times so far have been 5 and 4 hrs respectively. Needless to say my confidence was shaken and i was dreading getting a evening walk.

So naturally my next walk was scheduled to be in the evening. I was worried about finishing late and i convinced the camp organizers to let me start early (around 3:45pm) so that i'll have enough buffer to finish late. But i needn't have worried so much as it was a 'normal' line and i managed to finish it in exactly 2 hours. The next one was also similarly easy and i started to enjoy the evening lines more than the morning ones.

The walks were going smoothly now, but the wildlife sightings were low. Monkeys and Giant Squirrels were a common sight but the big animals like Deer, Gaur, Elephants and Bears were rarely seen. Frankly i was happy not to come across any of the big animals during my walks. Especially after hearing the local's stories about elephants which like nothing better than to pin you down and squish you with their heads, bears which enjoy eating your eyes and tickle you till your guts spill out and Gaurs which like to gore and snort nasty stuff all over you. Lol.. in the back of my mind i know that they exaggerate and that animal attacks are extremely rare but i still cant help feel scared at the prospect of meeting one of these wild things face to face in the jungle.

My last scheduled walk was in the evening. The transects were located far apart that day and since the driver was running late he dropped us off a long way before the start of our transect. And we basically got lost trying to find it!! The clock was ticking and we frantically searched the jungle for any signs leading to the start point.. apart from a couple of red dots (which turned out to be camera trap markings) we couldn't find anything. Once the clock struck 5pm i gave up and decided not to walk the line even if we managed to find it. It was then we sighted a lake and it seemed to our best bet for finding the line as we had heard about this lake being in the middle of the transect. The place was beautiful and walking along the lake was an absolute pleasure with lots of animal tracks along the shores. Soon we came upon the line and as expected it cut across the lake. There were a couple of boats near the shore and we figured that they were there to help us cross the lake. With about an hour of daylight left, we were in no hurry to get back and decided to explore the far shore. Frankly none of us knew how to row and for that matter swim very far either and it must've been an hilarious sight to see 2 us on a boat going around in circles without really moving forward. I was just keeping my fingers crossed hoping that the oar does fall off into the water which would basically leave us stranded in the middle of the lake :). By the time we crossed the lake and crossed back the light started fading and we had to rush back to the point where the jeep dropped us.

Whew!! that was quite an adventure.. but the evening was not over yet. We still had to safely get back to the camp. The jeep was with a different team and they will come pick us up only after their transect was completed. 7:15pm and it was completely dark already. Neither of us had a torch. The moon was not out yet and the only light available was from the stars. It was enough to see a couple of feet but nothing further. Every little sound from the jungle would make us jump and we made it a point to keep talking in order to allow any animals nearby to hear and avoid us. The conversation steered towards animal attacks and it made me even more jumpy. I felt that i had to take some control of the situation and the only survival techniques i knew for this situation was to either light a fire or get off the ground. A fire was out of the question as we didn't have any matches so with some help from Gokul (my teammate for the walk) i climbed up on top of rather tall signboard nearby and sat there. Im sure that it looked very comical and everyone (including me) would be laughing about this in the days to come.. but i didn't care. I felt safe up there and thats what mattered at the moment. Finally at 8:30pm the jeep finally came and we headed back to the camp.

The next morning i had walk an extra transect (because i didn't finish my last one). But i didn't mind as i got to drive the jeep and the walk also turned out to be quite scenic and very enjoyable. It was a perfect way to end the week.

This was quite easily one of the more exciting and memorable weeks of my life and i recommend the volunteering program to anyone. As long as you are reasonably fit and understand the dangers involved in working among wild animals. As for the CWS organization i wish that they paid more focus on safety. Just getting an indemnity bond signed is not enough. A formal safety briefing at the start of the camp should've been provided and i would've liked to seen some form of communication available between the camp (or even the jeep) and the teams walking the jungle. If some mishap happened it would take atlas 4-5 hours for the camp to realize that something is wrong and react to it.

As for me, i'd love to do this again in a park where the wildlife population is more dense. Somewhere like Nagarhole where i will be more out of my comfort zone and will get to face my fears head-on. But not before i learn how to climb a straight pole like those coconut pickers.