The next trip to Upper Siang district was really a continuum to the last trip; more hunted animals and more varieties of local beers. This time I approached Ramsing village from the Upper Siang district headquarter Yingkiong accompanied with a friend, Robin Abraham. After two days of travel we reached Yingkiong and crossed the Siang River on a bamboo raft.
The raft was indegenously made with Bambusa gigantica. Although water is welcome from the front it leaves from the back of the raft which has gaps in the bamboo. I was slightly tense with my camera, laptop, lens, binoculars and books on board. But we reached; we had to cross only about 40 m but with the Siang, a river with a characteristic of rapids, it took about 20 minutes.So there we were back in slightly familiar terrain. The evening was spent with a forest department watcher, Abot, who cooked a decent rice-dal meal which was followed up with a decent sleep of 7 hours. The next morning started with a view of snow capped mountains north-east of Ramsing village, possibly of the mountain range Eko Dumbing, an area rich in toxic aconite and one considered spiritually important by the Buddhists.
The plan of the day was to walk towards the Siring river, which originates from Mouling National park. We did some good birding along the way and reached possibly a 100-m height waterfall.
The walk was mostly aside rocks and ravines and we spotted at least 30 bird species, many of which I had not seen before. The evening was spent at the village homes, one of them being of the village leader who was just about to prepare his dinner. He definitely has the calmness and the know-how from what I gauge of the last time I met him.
The last time I met him I was overwhelmed with the skinning of a rhesus macaque and this time three different species of mammals; one of them a parti-coloured flying squirrel (the right most), two hoary-bellied Himalayan squirrels (top and centre) and a relatively large rodent I could not identify. Some of these were stewed while others were to be roasted.
With his permission, I took a picture of his catch over the last few decades.
Of the ones I could recognise, there’s wild boar, serow, muntjac, rhesus macaque, langur, Asiatic black bear, among others. I felt a bit giddy and lost as to where does all this stop or whether it does. Whether to raise awareness in city for people to use less electricity, recycle stuff, promote locally-made products OR to tell these communities to spare the rare species, the Serow, Black bear, Clouded leopards, and others. Perhaps both. Perhaps humans are just as invasive a species as the IUCN’s list of worlds 200 most invasive species, the list doesn’t feature the one species genius enough to ensure extinction of everything else along with it!
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