Living into the Wild

A New Begining

A prolific tigress who has lured many wildlife lovers for the past 6 years for her bold attitude, her elegant walk on the safari tracks, her enchanting eyes that can amaze everyone; this is one tigress the admirers of Bandipur  look forward to sight.  She is named Gauri. She now has a litter of 4. This is her 3^rd litter after an unsuccessful 2^nd litter.

Though she shares one of the largest territories of Bandipur, right from Dadekulchi to Mullapura, Bolguda, Kamlikalare, Wesley road etc. there is always a threat for her cubs from dominant male tigers, leopards and wild dogs. So she keeps on moving and changing her locations in it. She hasn’t been sighted for quite some time and speculations where already on prowl for this litter.

Bandipur | Jungle lodges & resorts ltd | 17-03-11

7 AM

This was an unexpected sighting for us during our morning safari. As soon as we entered and took the Balle link road, we were stupefied to see her walking with her cubs. This was my second sighting of a tigress with cubs in Southern India, the first was in K.Gudi late March 2010. And this was special as it was on open and on the road. I said to Pradeep (driver in Bandipur) not to move any further close and let us all watch this beautiful moment from a distance. She seldom looked towards us and continued walking and marking her territory. The cubs followed her as the sheep follows the shepherd. This sighting lasted for a minute or two until they merged into the bush.

What a wonderful moment for all of us !! Unexpected and blissful !! I wish and pray that this litter would bring a new hope for her and may she become successful in raising them all. Amen !!

Many a thanks to Naturalist Basavannah for details about Gauri. Also to Pradeep, naturalist Gurudutt, Ananth & his friend,  Nipun and other guests from Hyderabad for a great company in this safari.

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 19th, 2011 at 11:48 am. It is filed under Wild Encounters and tagged with Bandipur, Tiger. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.