Oh bouy… what a weekend I had.. I can’t express nor can my words and images/videos do the justice. One tiger versus 18 wild-dogs fighting over a kill at Kolara buffer of Tadoba.
Recently, I was in Tadoba over the weekend for a much needed regular, monthly break. I had randomly booked a safari for Kolara buffer. The news of Junabai litter was doing rounds in my photography circuit, so I decided to take my chances to track her and cubs. As destiny would have it, I failed in tracking her in scorching summer heat of April. The temperature was 43 degrees and it was humid thanks to early morning rains. The sultry weather was unforgiving. Since there were no signs of Junabai we decided to track K2 a 4 year old male tiger sighted frequently in recent past.
I criss-crossed many dry rivulets and nullahs on that bloody hot afternoon. The light was too bright and noisy. Noisy because of Cicada who became hyper active due unseasonal rains. Cicadas voice echoed in the jungle. What could be worse, our vehicle broke-down too. This noise became a good distraction from summer heat while tyres of gypsy were replaced. Once new tyre was put in place, we hastily started moving again to recover our lost time.
We reached water body called as Ainbodi which literally means pool of water in forest of Ain tree. The moment I looked at waterbody, my mouth was wide open and eyes glittery. I was looking at biggest pack of wild dogs anywhere till now. On walls of bodi, inside the water, walking, drinking and cubs playing, some sleeping. It seemed like they were having a gala time. They were 18 of them. They were so spread out that I couldn’t capture all in my telephoto lens. So I shot video which is available on my insta handle. Anyways, I enjoyed seeing them for long. After 15 mins, my guide insisted to continue tracking K2 since we had lost time when vehicle broke down. So I obliged and left wild-dogs to themselves and I started heading towards a water body called as Taka #44.
Taka 44 is approximately 1 kms away from Ainbodi. 44 is watering hole created by FD to store water for wildlife especially during summers. It frequented by all animals alike including tigers. When we reached 44, K2 was already there cooling himself and drinking water at his leisure and sleeping in waterbody itself. He continued this for almost for more than an hour. Until something caught his attention. I heard yaps, chatter and clucks of wild-dogs followed by squealing of Sambar deer. I had goose bumps. Same noises were heard by K2 too and he too got curious.
I was certain the wild dogs were on hunt and they had cornered the sambar deer. K2 was also aware of the same. He got up , climbed the bund (mud walls) and observed very carefully what was all the commotion about in his territory. He moved curiously to inspect. As soon as he saw the wild-dogs and deer, he ran towards them. The dogs gave way as they were scared of K2’s size and power. K2 went straight for jugular of deer to suffocate and make the kill.. The wild dogs kept barking and howling while the deer squealed his last breath with large huff. I had shiver all down to tail of my spine. I could not click images for sometime. I had lost sense of time, camera and everything else around me seemed irrelevant. The deer was dead in matter of minutes, injured to death by wild dogs but ultimately killed by tiger.
Ohhh, I can’t express what I felt. What I had witnessed are moments of natural history and will remain etched in my memories for life. The energy, the fear, the commotion, the noises and the chaos was surreal. I could feel the time pausing in eyes of dying deer. I could feel the pain and release of energy from that dying wild spirit. It was same feeling when I lost a loved one to excruciating pain right in front of my eyes. I had shiver in my spine as I lost track of time with the both the living and dead spirit of the wild.