Teesta Review: A Journal of Poetry, Volume 5, Number 1. May 2022. ISSN: 2581-7094
Tripod Finds a
Friend
– Roopa Satish &
Anitha Murthy
 |
| Image courtesy: Anupa Gardner https://www.dropbox.com/s/bib375f88ox1h80/tripod.tif?dl=0 |
Note:
This story is a dramatised version of true events. All names have been changed.
***
The waning moon hangs like a
silver bow in the dark sky. The thick canopy of the trees absorbs the inky
blackness of the still night like a sponge. There is no breeze, which makes the
rustling sound more ominous. Two shadows make their way cautiously in silence.
“Look. Up there.” One figure
nudges the other, as they peer into the darkness.
One of them reaches for his
torch and switches it on. The beam swings across the leaves, searching till it bounces
off something that looks like a pair of headlights gleaming in the darkness. Mission
accomplished.
One of the men shimmies up the
tree and plucks a round furball off the branch. He drops the furball into a
cardboard box and it lands with a thud. The two figures melt into the darkness
gripping the box tightly. They’ve made their small fortune for the night. It’s as easy as that.
***
There’s a nip in the air on a September
morning when I reach my office. It isn’t an office in the usual sense, the kind
that is coming up all over Bengaluru. The city is abuzz with construction
activity: roads and flyovers and underpasses are springing up any which way you
turn, high-rise apartment complexes are rapidly extending into the areas around
the city proper, and glass seems to be the in thing to build with, never mind
that it is not at all suitable to the climate of the place and will consume
energy like a monster because of the air-conditioning required. Bengaluru is a
happening city, people from all over the country, and indeed the world, are
flocking to it, and no one cares about how all the development is stripping the
land of its natural resources.
I am glad that the centre I work
at is far away from the city. It is part of the Bannerghatta National Park.
Just one acre of the allotted seven acres houses the buildings – the rest is
left untouched, with its trees and plants and animals. It is a haven indeed,
where I can breathe in clean air and believe that living in harmony with nature
is possible. I have always loved animals, and have studied to become a vet. And
now I work with rescuing and rehabilitating wild animals. There’s nothing that
gives me more happiness than to see untampered wildlife, existing as nature
meant it to be.
As I settle into my chair and
begin to look at some paperwork, I hear the noise of a vehicle approaching the
centre and wonder who that could be. Curious, I walk out to the entrance, joined
by my “boys” Umesh and Murali. An auto stops in front of the building, and I recognize
Sridhar. He is one of the many rescuers working with our centre. BBMP (Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike), which is the
governing authority for the city, has its own helpline that people can call if
they spot a wild animal in distress or they need any assistance. Apart from
those employed by the BBMP, there are several volunteer rescuers, who do this
kind of work as a service out of love for animals. But there are others too,
who do this for a fee. Everyone has their own motivation, I guess. But what’s
important is that these rescuers play a vital role in getting animals out of
places where they are not welcome to a more appropriate environment.
“Good morning, Sridhar,” I call
out. “You’ve brought something for me?”
“Good morning, ma’am,” Sridhar
gives me a bright smile. He is one of the volunteers, and is sincere in his
work. He lifts a cardboard box out of the auto and my boys help him to bring it
into the centre.
“It is a slender loris,
ma’am,” Sridhar tells me. “It is in bad shape. It was found lying on the road.”
“A slender loris?” I am
intrigued.
Slender loris is a really shy and
small primate found in Southern India and Sri Lanka. In Kannada, it is called Kaadu
paapa, or jungle baby. It has these large saucer shaped eyes that make it
look quite adorable. People in Bengaluru are not even aware that they share
their city with this unique and tiny mammal. They are solitary creatures though
many may live on the same tree. Places like the Indian Institute of Science and
surrounding areas which have a continuous canopy cover are ideal for these
animals to make homes there. It is
wonderful that there are still pockets of this city which are green and provide
a good habitat for such wildlife.
We take the box into the
“consulting room.” Sridhar has taken care to provide airholes in the box after taping
it shut. Most animals when rescued come to us like this. The rescuers often
have little or no equipment so an appropriately sized cardboard carton from a
nearby kirana shop will be used to house the creature for transport.
We first weigh the box along
with the slender loris inside it. My rule of thumb is to treat the animal based
on its body weight. We cannot always draw blood samples or do scans on the
animals. Sometimes they are too tiny and sometimes they are just too weak to
tolerate such tests. So, I base my medication doses on the body weight. Instead
of stressing the animal out by lifting it out of the box and trying to position
it on the scales, I just weigh the entire box. Later, I can subtract the weight
of the empty box from this weight to get the weight of the animal.
Once I’ve noted this down,
it’s time to open the box. We need to be really careful now.
Just imagine you were happily
playing with your friends, and suddenly, you were dragged away, hurt badly, and
left on the road. If anyone tried to come near you and help, you would be very
suspicious and careful, wouldn’t you? And if you felt you were in the slightest
danger, wouldn’t you want to run away or turn around and attack?
Rescued wild animals pretty
much feel the same way. They are unpredictable in their behaviour. Since they
are almost always rescued from unnatural surroundings, they are already
stressed out completely, and they could easily lash out by biting or attacking.
But my boys are well-trained. They
know how to handle all the animals, and without them, I would never be able to
treat the animals. I trust my boys with my life! We also communicate by just
signs and signals, because we want to make the least amount of noise.
Unexpected and loud noises will upset the animal even more, and we definitely
don’t want that.
The boys make sure that the
eyes of the loris are covered with a cloth when they lift it out of the box.
They also know exactly how to hold it. They grip its neck through a cloth. This
way, both vision and tactile information to the animal is reduced, and so the
stress to the loris is reduced as well.
Once the boys have the loris
in position, I examine it thoroughly. I need to check for temperature, swelling
or inflammation or redness anywhere, or loss of function. Now it is really very
difficult to figure out if a slender loris is a male or a female because their
identifying parts are hidden! So, for purposes of this narration, let’s assume
the loris that has been rescued is a female.
As I examine her, my heart
goes out to her. She is absolutely traumatized and petrified by whatever has
happened. I inspect her carefully, and as I see the burn wounds on her hands
and legs, and precise cuts made on the palm, forearm and arm of her left
forelimb, I feel a surge of anger. These are definitely not injuries that have
occurred in the wild because of say, another animal attacking or a fight with
another loris. No, these burn wounds and precise cuts point to one and only one
thing: human involvement.
India is a wonderful land of
ancient culture and heritage, and we should indeed feel proud of it. But what
of the terrible superstitions that still run deep? You might be surprised to
know, but there are many, many people who still believe in things like black
magic. Babas and fake gurus often take advantage of people’s fears and make
them believe that things like enchanted nimboos or sacrificial chicken or
goats will help them get what they want, or make their enemies suffer.
Unfortunately, the slender loris is also a tool used in black magic rituals.
Since they are nocturnal animals, they are hunted during the night. The slender
loris is harmless and has no defence mechanism as such. No claws that scratch
or sharp teeth that bite. Its cousin – the slow loris – at least has a venomous
bite. However, the slender loris does not, and so falls prey to people who want
to capture it for black magic. They use the slender loris as a voodoo doll, so
whatever injury they inflict on it, they believe their enemy will suffer the
same way.
I shudder as I remember a
heart-breaking incident earlier, where a slender loris that was brought in
showed no signs of injury on the outside, yet passed away quickly. An autopsy
showed that its heart had been pricked and it had bled to death on the inside. I
pray that this loris has not been attacked in the same way.
The
left forelimb is in a really bad shape and I am not sure if it will heal at all. It is
already showing signs of necrosis, or rotting. I give her a pain-killer – that
will definitely help in many ways.
It is now time to move her to
a different place. Over the next few days, we do everything to take care of
her.
We arrange for a sky kennel,
which is basically a large solid plastic box with metal bars. We place the
slender loris gently into the sky kennel and cover it with a cloth so that the
daylight doesn’t stress her out. I check out her diet and since she is
insectivorous, I make sure that she has a daily diet of insects like
cockroaches, dragonfly and grasshoppers. We actually catch these critters in
and around the centre. We also give her banana, which she really seems to like.
The typical weight of a slender loris is 275 gms, but this one weighed only 165
gms when she was brought in. She really needs to eat up!
Every day I check on her, and
every time I see her, I wonder how humans can be so cruel to animals. This slender loris looks like a sweet extra-terrestrial (ET)
creature, with its large saucer-shaped eyes, slender body, and long gangly
hands and legs. It is completely harmless, yet we seek it out and actively harm
it.
She seems to be becoming a
little better, but the left forelimb is a goner. There is no way to rescue it,
and so, after a month of waiting and watching, we finally bring her in for
surgery and amputate the left forelimb. The loris seems to recover more quickly
after this. The amputation wound heals completely in a month, and we can even
see her hair start to grow back on the stump. What a trooper she is!
Now that she’s showing signs
of becoming more active, we need to get her out of the sky kennel. We move her into
a larger enclosure. It is lined with coconut thatch to minimize the light, it
has ample place to move around and hang about, and I am delighted to see that she
is comfortable on just three limbs.
“She looks like a tripod,” I
laugh, and the name sticks. The boys, who clean and feed her and interact with her
daily begin to call her Tripod. I normally do not name my animals. It makes me
uncomfortable because once we name them, we begin to view them as pets. But
these are not pets – they are wild animals, and should remain wild.
However, I cannot help it with
Tripod. She is an exception – and a remarkable one at that. She is so shy, yet
so curious and alert, always watching us with her large eyes as we clean her
enclosure or give her food. She is so agile despite her amputated limb. She is
a born survivor. It is hard indeed not to grow fond of her.
A few months later, the police bring in
another loris, who appears to be yet another victim of the horrible black magic.
This loris too has similar burn wounds, but is not in as bad a shape. I go
through the same protocol of treatment. Once she has recovered in the sky
kennel, we decide to introduce her to Tripod.
Now the slender loris as such
is a solitary animal, and they go about foraging for food alone. However, they roost together in groups. Groups
usually consist of not more than seven members, made up of a female and her
offspring, and one or more males. They are nocturnal animals so they spend the
entire day sleeping and are awake and about at night. Many of us are like the
slender loris, aren’t we? This is why they have such large eyes, which enable
them to capture as much light as possible in the night in order to see.
We are quite curious about how
Tripod will react to the new entrant. Slender lorises can communicate to each
other through a variety of vocalisations, including whistles and chitters. Will
Tripod welcome her new pal? Or will she be hostile and show signs of
aggression?
We house Tripod and the new
loris in adjacent enclosures, and watch carefully. They appear to be
inquisitive about each other, and lose no time in communicating through the
wire mesh that separates them. This is happy news indeed!
We move them both into the same
enclosure, and as the days go by, we can see a discernible change in Tripod. She
looks healthier and happier, and it looks like the two lorises are not just
getting along fine, but actually helping each other heal, both physically and
emotionally. They seem to have bonded very well, and are now acting like BFFs!
About three months later, we
decide that it is time to release Tripod and her friend back into the wild. She
is showing remarkable agility and adapting to her new three-legged life with
ease. Her good friend is also supportive and together, we feel they can survive
the wild very well. They really need the wider canopy of trees to feel at home,
forage for food, and be themselves.
The release process is not
straightforward; there are forms to be filled and permissions to be taken. But
when all that is done, the day finally arrives.
These lorises feel like my
babies and though I feel sad to let them go, I know that this is what is best
for them. Wild animals should never be reduced to pets, meant to amuse and
entertain and divert us humans. They deserve their own lives as nature made
them and this is what I am meant to do.
We place the lorises in
baskets with twigs that they can hold on to. Night is fast approaching when we
travel to the designated release site in a safe, protected forest area. We carefully
remove the twigs from the basket, with the lorises hanging on to them. We place
these twigs strategically on the branches of a tree and step back.
Tripod and her friend look
around hesitantly, and as we hold our breath, they cautiously let go of the
twig and move to the branch. Feeling their way along the bark with their limbs,
they climb up the tree and soon they have disappeared into its thick foliage.
We wait for a few minutes more
before departing. Our job here is done. Tripod and her friend are back where
they belong.
It’s been several years now. Sometimes,
I think of Tripod and wonder what she is up to. Was she able to survive the
wild with the support of her friend? Is she still clambering up trees on her three
legs and hunting for food? Has she started a family?
Wherever she is, I wish Tripod
and her friend the best life she can have.
About the animal
·
Slender
Loris (Loris lydekkerianus) also called Gray Slender Loris, is native to
South India and Sri Lanka.
·
It
is nocturnal (meaning active at night) and arboreal (meaning living in trees).
·
It
is insectivorous (meaning it eats insects), but it can also eat some veggie
stuff.
·
It
has opposable thumbs, just like humans, so it can actually grip things.
·
Fun-fact:
It smears its entire body with its urine to protect itself against the stings
and bites of the little insects it feeds on.
·
It
is a mammal, and gives birth to its young ones. Twins are common, and the males
also help in child-care.
Why is it in
danger?
·
The
Slender Loris is one of the animals protected under the Indian Wildlife Act of
1972, under Schedule 1, which includes highly endangered animals like the
tigers.
·
It
cannot defend itself very well and falls easy prey to hunters.
·
It
is captured and used as a pet or as a source of captive entertainment.
·
It
is subjected to cruel treatment by practitioners of black magic.
·
Its
habitat of tree canopy is fast vanishing with unrestricted development.
----::----