Taking a GPS point in Arewala
While both kids were on their class trips, Tim and I headed out to MM Hills with Nagendra to get GPS points for each village and also to go see a cattle camp. It was a whirlwind trip with visits to all 9 of the villages I'm working in over a 4-day period.
Nagendra has almost finished all the interviews (he had about 4 left to do in some of the upper-elevation villages plus we decided to drop one of the low-elevation villages and selected a new village, closer to the Reserve, on this trip, so that's another 10).
The visit was good. We started off with a visit to Siddappa's parents who live in a village on the way to MM Hills. They were very sweet and hospitable and we got to drink fresh milk from their cows, eat rice from their paddies, and sambar and peanuts from their fields. I felt honored.
Nagendra has almost finished all the interviews (he had about 4 left to do in some of the upper-elevation villages plus we decided to drop one of the low-elevation villages and selected a new village, closer to the Reserve, on this trip, so that's another 10).
The visit was good. We started off with a visit to Siddappa's parents who live in a village on the way to MM Hills. They were very sweet and hospitable and we got to drink fresh milk from their cows, eat rice from their paddies, and sambar and peanuts from their fields. I felt honored.
We left Siddappa with his folks (his dad had recently had an accident with his scooter and Siddappa needed to spend some time with them) and went straight to getting GPS points in two of the low-elevation villages. Nagendra and I had visited and begun interviews in these villages, but when Nagendra came back without me to finish the interviews he made promises to the interviewees that next time he would "bring his madam" so they could meet me. Getting the points was not quick but it was really nice. I got to see a few of the families I'd met last month and ended up drinking a lot of coconut water and tea in a lot of houses. By the time we started up the mountain to MM Hills proper it was getting pretty late. The coolest thing was that we saw a pack of dhole (wild Indian dog) on the side of the road. I really didn't think I was going to see any while here in India so I was super-stoked. As usual, I wasn't able to indicate to the driver that I'd like to stop until the opportunity was too far behind us, but the dhole that I saw on a rock 3 feet off the side of the road, backlit by the setting sun is something I'm not going to forget any time soon.
We stayed in MM Hills for 4 days and they went really fast. The highlight was a hike to the forest cattle camp outside Gorsane. The Lingayat communities stay with their cattle in the forest for all but a couple months out of the year (not enough feed in the agricultural landscape). The forest is actually a lot of second growth -- it appears that the community was living and farming here until a couple decades ago (I heard they left in 1986, 1966, and 1996 -- take your pick), so there's probably a lot more fodder in the forest than would otherwise be there. Also, this is India, so the forests are full of mega-herbavores. We heard an elephant trumpeting on our hike down (it sounded just like a Hollywood soundtrack, how cool is that?) and when we got to the camp it turned out a group of elephants had been hanging out at the camp and near the river all night long. The herders were pretty freaked out by it; I get the feeling that elephant's are scarier than tigers in terms of danger to human life. When we walked to the river for a picnic breakfast there was all sorts of sign of elephants: broken branches, stripped limbs, rubbings, and huge piles of dung (no beetles). We also heard a muntjac (barking) deer. Now that's a crazy sound and I never would have guessed what animal it was coming from if Nagendra hadn't been there to tell me.
OK, I said that visiting the cattle camp was the highlight of the trip but meeting the people, both Soliga and Ligayat, who live here is always a joy.
The soils are really variable in this area, with a few pockets of deep loams but mostly shallow sandy, rocky soils. It's amazing that anything can grow in some of these soils. Combine that with this year's weak monsoon and for many people there was only a very small harvest. But everyone we met was so hospitable and helpful with the surveys. From my quick view of them it appears that crop diversity is decreasing (tho this is all recall-data so needs to be taken with a grain of salt). I was amazed at how much corn is being grown in this area. Most of the farmers only do one crop per year (planted with the monsoons) but a few have access to irrigation and plant two crops per year. The second crop seems to almost always be corn. The first crop may be corn (usually monoculture) or a more traditional planting of ragi (a millet), togari (pigeon pea), and mustard. Diet seems to be based mostly on ragi with different dhals making up a small portion and forest-gathered plants (lots of different leave, plus stuff like wild eggplant, etc) being pretty important.
Just being in MM Hills is a fun break from Bangalore. Being out of the traffic and city life is relaxing, seeing the different aspects of religion, and eating in the local hotel are all fun.
There were also lots of cool birds and I got to see my first Indian Roller (the Karnataka State Bird). Breathtaking!