Felids in Fields: Insights Into Tiger Movement Through Human Dominated Landscapes

The authors lead us through the journey of two young male tigers in the human dominated landscape of the Umred Karhandla Wildlife Sanctuary. In a world where man-animal conflict creates headlines, here is a story which speaks of acceptance and co-existence.

- Pallavi Ghaskadbi, Zehidul Hussain

The story unfolded in a beautiful little cave known as “Saatbhoki” (referring to the seven openings of the cave) where a tigress had littered and given birth to two male cubs. Sired by T1 (popularly known as Jai) and T3 (popularly known as T6 or Fairy), the two cubs were the heartthrobs of the Gothangaon area in the Umred Karhandla Wildlife Sanctuary (UKWLS). For us, however, the real action story started when the cubs were a year and a half old. By this time, they had started moving away from their mother and met her only occasionally. T 9 and T 10 roamed through their mother’s territory and explored the Eastern part of the Sanctuary together. The Sanctuary was also home to two other females who had littered around the same time. T2 (popularly known as Chandi) had 4 cubs- of which 3 were males and 1 was a female and she had made the western part of the Sanctuary her home. T4 (popularly known as Raee) resided in the Pauni range, which is the easternmost range of the sanctuary connected only by narrow strips of forest to the western part, and sired 3 cubs of which 2 were males and 1 was a female.