Elephants from Bhutan Trample Paddy, Tea, Betelnut, Bay Leaf Trees in Bengal
Deepanwita Gita Niyogi, The Citizen
July 30, 2024
See link
https://www.thecitizen.in/life/elephants-from-bhutan-trample-paddy-tea-betelnut-bay-leaf-trees-in-bengal-1053785
for photos.
Elephants are nothing new to Lonkeshwar Ray, who lives in the village of
Nodhabari in the northern Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal. “When a few
animals make an appearance, many of us feel happy on sighting them. But the
feeling does not last long when there are too many of them,” he says.
In Nodhabari and the 8-10 villages adjacent to it, elephant depredation is
a major concern for farmers like Lonkeshwar Ray. They are forced to guard
the crops all night, watching from makeshift structures like machans made
of bamboo and wood and hoisted on trees, to provide them greater security.
The farmers here were paddy farmers, but many are now experimenting with
tea. This is because elephants in a shrinking habitat often damage paddy
fields. In Nodhabari, where there are about 250 households, often the
farmers cannot sleep soundly. “When I fall asleep at night, there is no
guarantee that I will see the sun rise the next day. Whenever I hear a
sound, I immediately get up and light a torch,” says Ray. He started a tea
garden here ten years ago.
His neighbour Subhaschandra Ray says that paddy cultivation requires
intensive labour from start to finish. “We have to keep watch on the crop
from machans. Still, when elephants enter the villages in search of food,
they trample on the paddy fields, leading to extensive loss,” he explains.
Lonkeshwar explains the economics. “Per bigha (0.6 acres), farmers like me
have to spend Rs 10,000-12,000 on paddy cultivation. But instead of 18 to
20 mons of paddy (a mon is 40 kilos), we get two to five mons yearly as the
crop loss caused by elephants is high.” The paddy harvested from the fields
is mainly stored for household use throughout the year. To tide over his
losses, Lonkeshwar has started growing tea.
True to subsistence farming, he has created a small tea garden on a bigha
of land, and there are also other smaller gardens all around. “After
planting tea, the minimum waiting period is two years. The soil here is
beneficial to tea,” he explains. Lonkeshwar Ray employs three to five
labourers for plucking the tea leaves. Depending on the density, they pluck
about 10 to 30kg of tea leaves every harvest.
In Jalpaiguri’s Diana forest range, which lies close to the border with
Bhutan, forest ranger Ashes Paul says that the paddy season extends from
August to November while the maize season is from April to June. “In both
seasons, herds comprising 50-60 animals can be seen. The Bhutan foothills
about four to five km away and where paddy is cultivated on a large scale,
it attracts elephants and they often enter the tea gardens for crossing
over.” Posted here for about a year, Paul says he has worked in
elephant-prone areas for a long while. He adds that elephant behaviour is
changing.
“I have noticed a transformation over the years. In Naxalbari, where I was
once posted, the herds used to contain 120-150 elephants but here there are
no more than 50 animals to a herd. I think the herds are splitting up to
search for food more effectively.” According to Namdev Yedage, who works
for the Spenta Aid Foundation in this forest range, many people have
stopped cultivating paddy and maize in the past 20 years to ward off
elephants. Some areas have seen the growth of mustard farms and betel nut
plantations, but the elephants now damage these as well. In Kalikhola
Basti, a village close to the range office where Ashes Paul sits, residents
Shetu Subba and Shyam Tamang say that the solar-powered electric fencing
installed to keep the elephants at bay isn’t foolproof.
“At night we have to remain alert, especially in the monsoon. Once when
elephants entered our village, a person was flung aside, leading to serious
injury. The crop cover has been reduced to keep the elephants at bay,” says
Tamang. Also to counter the elephants, a few farmers here have planted
betelnut trees. But such plantations also pose problems as sometimes the
saplings are stolen, say Subba and Tamang, both of whom are members of the
local Joint Forest Management Committee. Another resident of Kalikhola
Basti, Gopal Pradhan, has been experimenting with bay leaf crops for the
past five-six years. “I sell the leaves to traders. Last year, I earned Rs
12,000.” Pradhan has about 400 bay leaf trees. Small tea gardens remain the
hot favourite, however. One such grower, Rajesh Roy, says he gets a good
income from selling tea leaves. “Paddy used to bring in Rs 50,000 annually.
In its place, tea ensures Rs two to three lakh a year.”
It has been for about four years since he began growing tea in his village,
Sipaipara. Roy employs four labourers paying each of them Rs 200 a day to
pluck the tea leaves. “In places where it is not possible to grow tea, some
of us still carry out some amount of paddy cultivation,” he explains. A new
problem has arisen with the flourishing of these small tea gardens. Tea
gardens created to ward off crop damage from elephant raids are giving rise
to human-leopard conflict in turn. Leopards permanently reside inside the
tea gardens where they also give birth to cubs. Workers in the big tea
estates share that they are afraid of the leopards there. Tersa Ekka works
in the New Chumta tea garden near Sukna. “Leopards lift cattle and pigs.
Once when I saw a leopard, I shouted loudly and the animal fled. The
animals are spotted at night in the villages,” says Ekka, who has been
working since she was 13 and is now 51. Amrita Oraon, who works in the
Nepuchapur tea garden in Jalpaiguri, was attacked by a leopard in April
this year. The Indigenous woman shares she had to spend Rs 10,000 at the
hospital for treatment.
The attack happened when she was engaged in plucking leaves. Shyama Prasad
Pandey from SPOAR, a local non-profit, says that any data on land-use
change is impossible to obtain as officially there is no such record.
“After conversion of paddy lands for tea gardens, these became a safe haven
for leopards. The animals and even their cubs started living in these
areas. Overall, it has been a 40 to 50 percent change in land use. The soil
here has always proved good for tea. There are many domestic tea gardens
and the monsoon rain is sufficient for them.”
According to Aritra K Shettry, a conservation ecologist with more than a
decade of studying and managing human-leopard conflict in northern Bengal,
it is market dynamics coupled with the persistent risk of damage to paddy
by elephants that has gradually led to the expansion of small tea planters
in the districts of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri. “While tea fetches higher
price compared to paddy, the vegetation cover accorded by tea and the easy
availability of livestock near human settlements enable the colonisation of
small tea gardens by leopards,” she explains.
https://www.thecitizen.in/life/elephants-from-bhutan-trample-paddy-tea-betelnut-bay-leaf-trees-in-bengal-1053785
Elephants from Bhutan Trample Paddy, Tea, Betelnut, Bay Leaf Trees in Bengal
Deepanwita Gita Niyogi, The Citizen
July 30, 2024
See link
<https://www.thecitizen.in/life/elephants-from-bhutan-trample-paddy-tea-betelnut-bay-leaf-trees-in-bengal-1053785>
for photos.
Elephants are nothing new to Lonkeshwar Ray, who lives in the village of
Nodhabari in the northern Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal. “When a few
animals make an appearance, many of us feel happy on sighting them. But the
feeling does not last long when there are too many of them,” he says.
In Nodhabari and the 8-10 villages adjacent to it, elephant depredation is
a major concern for farmers like Lonkeshwar Ray. They are forced to guard
the crops all night, watching from makeshift structures like machans made
of bamboo and wood and hoisted on trees, to provide them greater security.
The farmers here were paddy farmers, but many are now experimenting with
tea. This is because elephants in a shrinking habitat often damage paddy
fields. In Nodhabari, where there are about 250 households, often the
farmers cannot sleep soundly. “When I fall asleep at night, there is no
guarantee that I will see the sun rise the next day. Whenever I hear a
sound, I immediately get up and light a torch,” says Ray. He started a tea
garden here ten years ago.
His neighbour Subhaschandra Ray says that paddy cultivation requires
intensive labour from start to finish. “We have to keep watch on the crop
from machans. Still, when elephants enter the villages in search of food,
they trample on the paddy fields, leading to extensive loss,” he explains.
Lonkeshwar explains the economics. “Per bigha (0.6 acres), farmers like me
have to spend Rs 10,000-12,000 on paddy cultivation. But instead of 18 to
20 mons of paddy (a mon is 40 kilos), we get two to five mons yearly as the
crop loss caused by elephants is high.” The paddy harvested from the fields
is mainly stored for household use throughout the year. To tide over his
losses, Lonkeshwar has started growing tea.
True to subsistence farming, he has created a small tea garden on a bigha
of land, and there are also other smaller gardens all around. “After
planting tea, the minimum waiting period is two years. The soil here is
beneficial to tea,” he explains. Lonkeshwar Ray employs three to five
labourers for plucking the tea leaves. Depending on the density, they pluck
about 10 to 30kg of tea leaves every harvest.
In Jalpaiguri’s Diana forest range, which lies close to the border with
Bhutan, forest ranger Ashes Paul says that the paddy season extends from
August to November while the maize season is from April to June. “In both
seasons, herds comprising 50-60 animals can be seen. The Bhutan foothills
about four to five km away and where paddy is cultivated on a large scale,
it attracts elephants and they often enter the tea gardens for crossing
over.” Posted here for about a year, Paul says he has worked in
elephant-prone areas for a long while. He adds that elephant behaviour is
changing.
“I have noticed a transformation over the years. In Naxalbari, where I was
once posted, the herds used to contain 120-150 elephants but here there are
no more than 50 animals to a herd. I think the herds are splitting up to
search for food more effectively.” According to Namdev Yedage, who works
for the Spenta Aid Foundation in this forest range, many people have
stopped cultivating paddy and maize in the past 20 years to ward off
elephants. Some areas have seen the growth of mustard farms and betel nut
plantations, but the elephants now damage these as well. In Kalikhola
Basti, a village close to the range office where Ashes Paul sits, residents
Shetu Subba and Shyam Tamang say that the solar-powered electric fencing
installed to keep the elephants at bay isn’t foolproof.
“At night we have to remain alert, especially in the monsoon. Once when
elephants entered our village, a person was flung aside, leading to serious
injury. The crop cover has been reduced to keep the elephants at bay,” says
Tamang. Also to counter the elephants, a few farmers here have planted
betelnut trees. But such plantations also pose problems as sometimes the
saplings are stolen, say Subba and Tamang, both of whom are members of the
local Joint Forest Management Committee. Another resident of Kalikhola
Basti, Gopal Pradhan, has been experimenting with bay leaf crops for the
past five-six years. “I sell the leaves to traders. Last year, I earned Rs
12,000.” Pradhan has about 400 bay leaf trees. Small tea gardens remain the
hot favourite, however. One such grower, Rajesh Roy, says he gets a good
income from selling tea leaves. “Paddy used to bring in Rs 50,000 annually.
In its place, tea ensures Rs two to three lakh a year.”
It has been for about four years since he began growing tea in his village,
Sipaipara. Roy employs four labourers paying each of them Rs 200 a day to
pluck the tea leaves. “In places where it is not possible to grow tea, some
of us still carry out some amount of paddy cultivation,” he explains. A new
problem has arisen with the flourishing of these small tea gardens. Tea
gardens created to ward off crop damage from elephant raids are giving rise
to human-leopard conflict in turn. Leopards permanently reside inside the
tea gardens where they also give birth to cubs. Workers in the big tea
estates share that they are afraid of the leopards there. Tersa Ekka works
in the New Chumta tea garden near Sukna. “Leopards lift cattle and pigs.
Once when I saw a leopard, I shouted loudly and the animal fled. The
animals are spotted at night in the villages,” says Ekka, who has been
working since she was 13 and is now 51. Amrita Oraon, who works in the
Nepuchapur tea garden in Jalpaiguri, was attacked by a leopard in April
this year. The Indigenous woman shares she had to spend Rs 10,000 at the
hospital for treatment.
The attack happened when she was engaged in plucking leaves. Shyama Prasad
Pandey from SPOAR, a local non-profit, says that any data on land-use
change is impossible to obtain as officially there is no such record.
“After conversion of paddy lands for tea gardens, these became a safe haven
for leopards. The animals and even their cubs started living in these
areas. Overall, it has been a 40 to 50 percent change in land use. The soil
here has always proved good for tea. There are many domestic tea gardens
and the monsoon rain is sufficient for them.”
According to Aritra K Shettry, a conservation ecologist with more than a
decade of studying and managing human-leopard conflict in northern Bengal,
it is market dynamics coupled with the persistent risk of damage to paddy
by elephants that has gradually led to the expansion of small tea planters
in the districts of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri. “While tea fetches higher
price compared to paddy, the vegetation cover accorded by tea and the easy
availability of livestock near human settlements enable the colonisation of
small tea gardens by leopards,” she explains.
https://www.thecitizen.in/life/elephants-from-bhutan-trample-paddy-tea-betelnut-bay-leaf-trees-in-bengal-1053785