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Elephant can sense things on its front. Which means, should you have a need to escape from an elephant, always try moving behind it. It would walk an average of 60 km a day and would sleep in the standing position only. Should you encounter an elephant while driving through the forests road, NEVER disturb it in any fashion. Just wait on the road and allow the herd to pass. Remember, single elephants are much more dangerous to handle than a herd. Electric fences are set up in some areas to prevent elephants from infiltrating into the human habitat. However, all voltage levels should be limited to causing only temporary withdrawal response and shouldn't harm the animals in any fashion.
Tigers have a very excellent sense of living. They don't typically live in very deep jungles. They would need shrub forest to survive since their preys would be maximum only in shrub forest area. You could be walking on the jungle road and a tiger could be quite nearby - totally unperturbed by your presence. However, habitat loss is something that would make them lose their space and is the threatening factor for them at present. Often, when instances of man-animal conflict get reported, the preceding factors responsible for this conflict to exists in the first place aren't probed or go untold. Tiger census is typically taken following the pug marks of the tiger. The path would be traced using elephant movements. A tiger typically survives alone. Female tigers resist any kind of procreation activity until their cubs are at least 5 months old. It has very clearly established territories and would never allow another tiger to enter into it. If there is a compromise on the territory, typically there would be a fight between the two tigers in question and one of them would die for sure. Should someone state that there was a sighting of several tigers together around the same area, it would be an obvious lie..! After quite a lot of efforts that failed in protecting the tiger, the Indian government decided to rope in the tribal community itself into the conservation effort. The area spanning Mudumalai in Tamil Nadu, Wayanad in Kerala and Bandipur/Nagerhole forest in Karnataka actually constitute a single zone for forest purposes and is a reserved region in addition to being a tiger sanctuary.
Hyenas were present in a cave near the Masinagudi area in very large numbers. They are typically nocturnal creatures that help maintain the health of the forests since they eat the dead animals. With diclofenac and other poisoning happening, a lot of hyenas and vulture died in the Nilgiris biosphere reserve.
Leeches are a nightmare to deal with when you walk for something into the forest area. Common salt is used to battle the problem.
Wild dogs hunt in packs and has the highest success rate - around 95%. It is the only one which probably has the capability to hunt down a bison (the bison is pachydermic in nature..!!).
A sloth bear would have red eyes. Not all bears are herbivorous.
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That was definitely some wild talk..!! Well, believe me, all of these were literally pulled out and laid to us neatly by Vinoth, our teammate, right from the top of his mind, as if someone were just asking what is his name..! He has a very deep interest in wildlife conservation and photography, in addition to IT.
When we decided to start touring the Nilgiris, we couldn't have had a better person that Vinoth with us. He joined us despite his ill health and showed us areas of the NBR (Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve) which none of us could've experienced otherwise..!
With Saravanan and Sundeep being present, some form of comedy is going to be guaranteed..! :-) And it did.
Aravind was negotiating a very very deep hairpin bend uphill towards Ooty from Mudumalai. There were a couple of cars which chose not to respect the "uphill vehicles first" rule. Quite peeved at repeated violations on this which gave Aravind a tough time managing to drive, Saravanan decided it was high time someone be taught a lesson or two. He yelled out to one of the cab drivers going downhill - "We are coming up slowly because three hairpin bends down, elephants are present.!"
As for Sundeep, his rather loud, clear and threatening voice to Aravind, "சும்மா இருங்க.. சிங்கம் புலி யானை கரடா" nu... "இங்க இந்த இருடுக்கே பயமா இருக்கு..!" made everyone laugh out loud... Obviously, he was asked if he thought female bears were கரடி and male ones கரடா in Tamil..!
To us Chennaiites accustomed to the "Cinema. Caaram. Coffee", "Food. Forest. Flesh" was definitely a different terrain, thanks to our dear Vinoth..!
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"As she chirrups 'entertainment. entertainment. entertainment.' the world is at her feet" - so went a write-up in a prominent English daily.
One of my friends quipped in his SMS to me, "Do you realize that even VB (Vidya Balan) might not have seen the movie so many times?" - to my call to have a trip to the DP (Dirty Picture) movie once (oh yeah, it was once more and not once really..!)
Definitely, to her credit, VB has not diminished her acting prowess a wee bit. And being quite verbose with an umpteen one-liner punches, the movie isn't something one could watch without a decent grip of Hindi. "Entertainment. Entertainment. Entertainment." is just one example of a simplistic as well as a catchy and punchy one-liner. Like NOKJ (No One Killed Jessica), the "reel-real" mixture has been taken care of pretty decently. "Oh la la Oh la la" definitely has a beat that would keep your feet tapping while "Ishq sufiyaana" would be for the ones who crave for a good melody beat.
Never mind the generous pokes I get from my friends, I do feel that DP is definitely a paisa-wasool. After all, movie is all about "Entertainment. Entertainment. Entertainment".
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