How a chance rescue in Arunachal Pradesh led to the discovery of a new tortoise species
25 June 2019
Four
days back, when Bunty Tao, a ranger under the Hapoli forest division in
Arunachal Pradesh’s Kamle district, saw the tortoise, it was buried in
the arms of a villager.
“They were taking it home — possibly
to make a meal out of it,” says the 47-year-old Tao, who then decided
to intervene. “I immediately asked them to hand it over. ‘Hunting is
wrong’ — I told them before riding off.”
Tao, who joined the
forest department as an 18-year-old almost three decades ago, then fed
the tortoise and kept him in a forested plot of land near his home. But
before that he took a picture and sent it to ‘Arunachal Against
Hunting’, one of the many wildlife-related Whatsapp groups he is a part
of.
“I’ve seen turtles and tortoises before, but I knew this one
was special. It looked grand and impressive,” says Tao. Little did he
know his chance rescue would spell what could be potentially be a new
chapter in history of turtle conservation in the Northeast.
Read
full story here
|
