Wildbuzz: The heart of hawking
Amritsar has been a symbolic choice for the ongoing Heart of Asia - Istanbul Process conference as it was historically the east-west gateway. That main artery to Asia’s heart now stands blocked by Pakistani obduracy. Before Partition, Amritsar was one of the leading ‘mandis’ (markets) for falcons and hawks that were trapped from the high mountains, trained and used for hunting.
Amritsar has been a symbolic choice for the ongoing Heart of Asia - Istanbul Process conference as it was historically the east-west gateway. That main artery to Asia’s heart now stands blocked by Pakistani obduracy. Before Partition, Amritsar was one of the leading ‘mandis’ (markets) for falcons and hawks that were trapped from the high mountains, trained and used for hunting. Located at the crossroads of Central and South Asia, Afghanistan played a key role in transferring the art of hawking/falconry from one region to another. It was from Kabul that the founder of the Mughal dynasty, Zahiruddin Babur, set out for India. The renowned 17th century poet-falconer, Khushal Khan Khattak, also hailed from the same race. Said Khattak: ‘’The falconry field requires great skill and art/But the Afghans know this art by heart.”
In contemporary Afghanistan, falconry/hawking has survived the ravages of war and the preferred bird captured and trained for hunting is the Northern goshawk. This raptor is also the State Bird of Indian Punjab due to its association with the Sikh Gurus. In fact, growing strategic ties with Afghanistan can be leveraged to procure goshawks for Chhatbir zoo’s raptor conservation breeding and awareness programme, which is languishing as sourcing is proving difficult for the Punjab government. Then Afghanistan president Hamid Karzai’s spokesperson, Karim Rahimi, was also an avid falconer.
According to the latest report prepared on the status of falconry in Afghanistan by the South Asia Officer for the International Association for Falconry (IAF), Kamran Khan Yousufzai, falconers have been confined to home towns. They do not venture deep into mountains as the Taliban have banned falconry due to the fear that roving falconers will leak their hideouts to armed forces.
Yousufzai’s report, ‘Falconry in the War-torn Afghanistan’, lists the need for Afghan falconers to adopt modern methods and work towards conservation of raptors and their quarry such as Chukor, See-see partridge, quail, hares, foxes, antelope fawns and Black francolins. The falconers’ quarry has shown a steep decline in turmoil-ridden years due to illegal gun, trap and poison hunting and weak law enforcement. ‘’Peregrine and Saker falcons are smuggled out of Afghanistan. We met the Afghan deputy minister of culture and information Zardasht Shams, and urged him to preserve falconry and submit Afghanistan’s case for inclusion in Unesco’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity,’’ Yousufzhai told this writer.
Pink legs, less seen
Fourteen years after the Sukhna lake was graced by a very uncommon visitor, the species has again registered in the log book of avian migrants. On November 27, 2016, wildlife photographer Sarabjit S Lehal observed six Common shelducks at the Sukhna. These birds are not at all common in these parts as their common name may suggest!
The six were clicked the same day for a record shot by Prof Mitinder S Sekhon. The first record for this migratory bird’s observation at the Sukhna was January 2002 and were photographed by an insurance company official and lensman, Sanjay Kaushal, who meticulously photo-documented the lake’s rich avian diversity. Like in 2002, when they were observed only for two days, the shelducks did not stay long at the Sukhna this season. Only one specimen was observed by this writer on November 28 and none on December 1.
Kaushal’s record of 2002 is from the era when the lake’s regulator-end was a mosaic of silt islands, marshes and reed-encircled ponds. This ensured not only a very high number of migratory waterfowl but records of such rarities for the Sukhna as the shelduck and Common merganser. In the current season, due to shallow waters and weeds for food, the migratory waterfowl have descended in good numbers (estimated 1,300) though still not as rich in profile as embedded in the ecological era that preceded the de-siltation drives.
Ghost of the garden
A butterfly of striking colour and pattern can hardly be missed, flitting about in the tricity’s gardens. But moths are an altogether different proposition because they are nocturnal creatures and are so well camouflaged and hidden in nooks and corners of bungalows during the day that they are invariably missed by householders. The other night, a striking Oleander Hawk moth appeared out of its dark refuge and settled comfortably on my late father’s nameplate in the verandah of our Chandigarh house. Moths are really a subject for curious minds, as this one was the proverbial ghost of my garden. I had never seen this strange creature and could never have imagined it lived in our proximity. Once it settled down on the nameplate, it was loathe to move: frozen like a mummy, with an intimidating pattern on its back - like a Halloween mask - to put off predators.
(vjswild1@gmail.com)