Dholes (Cuon alpinus)

[Shadow]

I have been reading the book: Tiger! The Story of the Indian Tiger (published 1977) from Kailash Sankhala. He also mention dholes.

He tells how badly wounded, practically disemboweled chital ran to resting area and very near to people there and after it 2 dholes chasing it stops near the fence. Then he writes how another same kind of situation happened, when Sankhala had a camp in Periyar National Park. Pack of 18 dholes was chasing a sambar deer, which crossed a river and closed up camping place full of people while dholes waited keeping a distance about 100 meters or so.

He say, that in Bandipur chitals show by their behaviour bigger fear for dholes than for humans by coming to fenced resting places in the woods on night time. That on the whole resting place can be seen eyes of chitals shining here and there in the dark even though there is noise from cars and people and lights here and there. And in the morning they leave place and go back in the woods. He say, that he don´t know cases where a chital would have ran from humans towards dholes.

He also say, that there is no other predator like dhole (in India), what comes to teamwork, relentlessness and brutality in hunting. Even their appearance causes panic and when they have chosen target, prey is doomed. Sankhala describes one hunting which he managed to see, where a pack of 21 dholes hunted 2 chital calves. He then saw how older calf managed to flee while younger fled to water, where dholes got it. He also writes about the way dholes hunt and how they often chase prey into the water for "operation drowning" while one dhole follows it and other wait on the shores. Just what can be seen from recent video footages.

Then he writes how dhole has ecologically it´s own position and value. He say, that it doesn´t fear any other predator, not even the tiger while being only competitor for it and he tells that when looking 10 most typical prey animals of tiger, dhole hunts 6 from those. He writes, that always when packs of dholes appeared to fields of Kanha, Sankhala noticed, that his chances to see tigers decreased and he had to wait for weeks until dholes left the area.

He say, that even though tiger is more than equal with dholes, it for some reason leave the "field of action" for them when dholes appear. He writes, that reason would be, that tigers want to avoid that harm, what dholes cause by disturbing with long pursuits all prey animals on area. Their often happening hunting and terror what they spread on area reduces tigers chances for making successful ambush attacks on prey. Then he mention, that time to time dholes even make tiger go away from a kill and occasionally even chase it to the tree. He also mention, that in some occasions those would have killed tigers, in that he mention paintings ( no number, using term some) and some recent observations (good to remember, that book was published 1977).

He writes like dholes are very beneficial, what comes to ecological balance by eliminating overpopulations of some prey animals. While only thing eliminating overpopulation of dholes have been insufficient number of prey leading to starvation and/or epidemics.

I don´t have quotes or pictures, because I have been reading finnish translation of that book. But Kailas Sankhala is easy to google and check who he is and books, that he have written. Some might have that book too, so easy to read from there same. I tried to translate as good as I could :) 

It was nice to notice, that Sankhala had made also some observations about dholes and their impact in different ways.

One more piece to this puzzle, what comes to dhole reputation and what they have been seen to be doing and what might be seen in future. Hopefully there would soon be more studies about dholes. The more reading about them, the more interesting animal it is :) Observations of Sankhala are fascinating to read. Reply