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In Forests of Dooars, North Bengal
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It took more than an hour to unfold. I can't make a 1080p video that long. Plus, i needed a good zoom-camera at very limited budget. My Canon Powershot SX430 IS can do stills at 45X, but can't even focus properly in video at that distance.
A sequence of photos was the best i could do. (01-18-2019, 07:20 PM)Jimmy Wrote: As much for it's historic importance for wildlife, I really don't know how it is holding up at present. I know migration route of elephants passes all the way to Eastern Nepal- Koshi reserve (reserve for Nepalese wild buffaloes)from this exact place but really don't know what other mega faunas are still present, looking at the map, it looks to be on quite a strategic and crucial point for wildlife exchange between Terai and Assam. Reading your post I felt this region has been altered quite drastically with road and tracks maybe for the link between main part of India and Assam, probably government already has development projects and other infrastructures program in place rather than demarking ecological areas here. Also contrary to being on supposedly such an impressive location for wildlife (one of the best biodiversity hotspots place in my view currently if it was to develop that way-what could be more impressive than a point of linkage between Terai -Assam and Himalaya) i haven't heard of any truly famous parks here, what could be the reason? These areas like Dooars or Chhotanagpur plateau that were wildlife hotspots during the British Rule, suffered due to mismanagement by them & subsequent governments post-independence continued those practices until it was too late. Even today, most of the fringe-forest dwellers straining these regions were brought in & settled by them from elsewhere to work as labourers in mines or tea plantation. Today the former legends like Satkosia, Buxa, Palamau are fragmented with huge populations dependent on them. Do you know that they used to mine Dolomite in the Core area of Buxa until few years ago! Similarly, too much stress on tourism than actually conserving the inviolateness of the forests patches meant that they thought that laying rail-tracks through the pristine forest would be a good idea... scenic journey & all. Even major roads are right through the forests & although speed limit is 40-50 km/hr, the minimum speed travelled at is 60 km/hr. That can rise as high as 80-100 km/hr... especially at night. The whole length needs to be littered with rubber speed-humps. (BTW someone shared the following compilation on FB, original footages are all from Jasoprakas Debdas, the best YouTube channel on North Bengal's wildlife. WATCH THOSE. If you haven't seen his work, you're missing something in life!)  *This image is copyright of its original author Bengal has been lagging behind by an era as far as developing conservation mindset is concerned! Thankfully recently another track to Northeast India has been developed farther south of the forests. In future, all trains not catering to the people living along the forested tracts, will follow that route.  *This image is copyright of its original author
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