Update on Home News, and about "Tigey" - India and Saving Tigers.

Dear readers,

Things are beginning to change for this family - my son Tom is home for 3 days to get used to being being out of the mental hospital ward again. He has been back about an hour as I write: it is mid-day. He seems fairly settled here so far, listening to his music upstairs. He will go out for a bicycle ride later on, and tomorrow he and I will go to our church (and its household) all day. The weather here is beautiful - we at last have a late summer in the UK, with glorious sun (an "Indian summer" - which I think refers to India, not Native Americans).

The man who stabbed and killed someone in Richmond Park has been charged and appeared in court - the Park is open again, much to everyone here's relief. Its closure was affecting many other local roads, which were much more congested with traffic: it meant we could not get through by car to see Tom 2 days ago, and I continued the journey on bus (as buses get priority in special lanes on most main roads in London). Also we could not take Tom into Richmond Park for a walk - which we had been doing most days that he has been in hospital - but had to make do with Putney Heath much nearer the hospital. That is OK - quite peaceful, but smaller, more wooded and without the grand, wide vistas we get in the big, spacious Richmond Park (which has two species of deer herds and a great variety of other wildlife: woodpeckers, jays, ducks, foxes, badgers, rabbits, various bats and insects).

Why am I called "Tigey"? There are two reasons. One is that it is the nickname of our ginger striped cat, who reminds us of a tiger, especially when out in his domain, our rather wild garden, with its long grass and undergrowth. He has become "Tigey" although his real name is "Whitton". The other reason is that I am a true admirer of tigers, especially those in the wild. I travelled to India in 2002 (in honour of my late daughter Alice, who died in 2000), particularly to support efforts to save the tiger (a much endangered "flagship" species) by appealing for sponsor money for my trip. About half of this went towards tiger projects in the nature reserves of that part of Central India: Madhya Pradesh. The two National Parks I visited were: the Kanha National Park and the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. I spent about 5-6 days at each site. I was travelling without my family, but with a tour group arranged by Discovery Initiatives, a responsible green travel company in the UK: 2 of us travelled on behalf of 21st Century Tiger, which is based at London Zoo. This combines the work of Global Tiger Patrol with the resources of London Zoo - it is a specialised charity aimed at raising funds for and awareness of the plight of tigers in the wild.

On both our jungle stays we spent the days going out on safari to observe and track tigers and other wildlife. Kanha is the original "Kipling Country" (from the classic books by Rudyard Kipling: The Jungle Book, etc.) - this is where Mowgli's and Baloo the Bear's adventures with Shere Khan (the man-eating tiger in the stories) were actually based. It is a leafy "sal" forest, with many cool, shady glades and spacious golden "maidan" or meadows. We drove with our experienced guides along sandy tracks, which are often used by tigers. You could see tigers' pugmarks (paw prints)in the sand: fresh or older tracks, which told the guides when a tiger was there. Also we learnt from the alarm calls of other creatures (spotted "chital" and large red "sambar" deer, black faced langur monkeys and jungle birds) when a tiger was moving through as area. In the thickest jungle we rode on elephants to get nearer to the tigers; we actually saw about 4 at Kanha, and I filmed 2-3 of them at close range. That experience was so exhilarating that I got a real high or "rush" of adrenalin from seeing my first young male tiger, lying, paws tucked in like a huge tabby pussy-cat, under some thick green leaves in the forest. We also learned much about the other jungle wildlife, such as the many birds; and just to see the jungle at dawn or sunset was an unrepeatable experience - so quiet, yet always menacing in its beauty. There is a "green corridor" for wildlife to travel between here and the next jungle area I visited, Bandhavgarh.

At Bandhavgarh we stayed in the beautiful Jungle Lodge (where traditionally built wattle and daub bungalows were covered with bougainvillea, and marigolds grew profusely); we also went on safari drives, and also climed up to the plateau top of the Red Cliff, where there are ruins of an old Maharajah's Fort and temples. These belonged to the Maharajahs of Rewa, and were built in the 10-11th Century. On the walk up the track, we started from an ancient spring fed pool where there was a huge reclining stature of the god Vishnu, resting on the 7 coiled serpent Sheshnaya. We passed through several fortified gateways, which had dark side cavities in which we could smell bat urine and hear the chatter of many bats - just like something out of that "Indiana Jones" film (I.J. and The Temple of Doom). The views from the top were fantastic - you could see for miles across the hillocks, forests and flat plains of the tiger reserve below - and the paths along which tigers often walked. This reserve is much dryer than Kanha, being nearer to the Equator, and is typfied by bamboo groves and more scrubby forest; it is also quite rocky, with an area of rocky ravines, caves and potholes. Vultures were flying out from an eyrie on the side of the cliffs. Tigers also frequented the plateau top, but we did not meet one! On my last day at Bandhavgarh, we saw a female tiger walk out on to the track just behind our jeep - I was too excited to film her well. She walked off through long, golden grass, up to a forest where her two cubs were. I got some long shots of her.

I was able to film all this - I'd bought a video camera specially for this trip. I also took many slides which I have since used to give talks on Central India and its nature reserves. The grey stone, ancient temple buildings and statues showed up clearly against the perfect clear blue skies. This was in November, an ideal time for Westerners to visit india - temperatures are bearable, and it is after the Monsoon. I learned a lot about the habits of tigers, and what is being done in India to help conserve them. Each reserve had educational centres, and books were available to borrow or buy. At Kanha they showed us how tigers were recorded, laboriously by hand, by the rangers: each tiger's distinctive pugmark and set of facial features was drawn on A4 paper in a ring binder. There was a more sophisticated "Orientation Centre", which had special electronic exhibits, lectures and film shows. I have not had time or space here to describe all we saw - we also visited a fossilised forest, and spent 2 days in Delhi. I am sure this journey was the most interesting and exciting one that I have ever done; it is the furthest I have ever been. I truly wish to return to India' tiger reserves - maybe in the next 2 years, before I may get too old to travel (and "rough it" - there was much heavy overland journeying by 4-wheel drives or train; we had a minor road crash, and most of us got "Delhi Belly" for 1-2 days - seriously sick). I fell in love with India - and am still fascinated by it. I realised there is much else there to explore - in the north and south - and two weeks is never enough to get to know a place and its people.

So this is why I use the pen-name "Tigey" - I love tigers and all big/wild cats, plus small doemstic ones... I wish more could be done to save the tiger in the wild - some tiger species are now extinct, and others dying out. The Indian Royal Bengal Tiger has the best chance of survival; the Amur or Siberian Tiger is under threat, and the Sumatran sub-species has almost disappeared. There are a number in Indo-China. India has her own Project Tiger, set up by then Prime Minister Mrs. Indira Ghandi in 1972 - this has done much to help Indian tigers, but tiger poaching for traditional medicine remains a serious problem, and villagers fear and kill "man-eaters" and cattle predators in some areas. (Only in the Sundarbans National Park, a huge salt marsh area, is man-eating a real problem. Tigers prefer deer, wild boar or cattle, their natural prey species.)

Signing off again - I shall return to my Indian experience in a future blog.

Love to all, Tigey