Starting a thread for the purpose of informing those bothered by the #ElephantDeathCase on how cultivation in hilly terrains are always at the risk of man-animal conflict. The accounts are personal and pics and vids are mine. I'm a western ghats farmer.
#ElephantDeath
#ElephantDeath
Notice the green garden net? That's what we do to keep away wild boars and wild goats.
Cost - ₹2000 for 30m roll with a width of 5ft.
We can afford it because we have other sources of income and hence it is feasible to protect our field boundaries using this.
Cost - ₹2000 for 30m roll with a width of 5ft.
We can afford it because we have other sources of income and hence it is feasible to protect our field boundaries using this.
What about farmers who cannot afford these? No. Not snares right away. See the pic. Notice the blue Saree attached to the garden net? 
If one can't afford garden nets, then the solution is to buy rejected sarees from textile mills in Madurai.
Lorries ferrying produce from the hills to the planes, bring back consumer goods. Through them, we get the sarees.
Cost - ₹150 per Kg.
Lorries ferrying produce from the hills to the planes, bring back consumer goods. Through them, we get the sarees.
Cost - ₹150 per Kg.
However these Sarees are not durable. They're not meant to withstand heat, rain, wind or in our case extreme cold. Even though they're not durable, farmers are forced to use them. What about farmers who cannot afford these sarees?
Such farmers, take turns sitting up through the night guarding their fields. When the raiding parties arrive, they clang utensils and shoo them away(No. No Corona Go).
However, they'll have to work in their fields in the morning. And they'll have odd jobs in the village because let's face it, if food crop farmers were given what they're truly owed (cost + 50% as mandated by MS Swaminathan Commission), a lot of you guys in your gated communities
...will have to forgo your IPhones and designer clothes. Some might have to forgo the gated community itself! Remember, farmers subsidise your existence. It is not the other way around.
So when pushed to the limit, farmers use snares to deal with crop raids.
So when pushed to the limit, farmers use snares to deal with crop raids.
No farmer wishes to kill any of these wild animals. But very few have access to these obscenely expensive alternatives. So before we point fingers at our farmers for their "inhumanity" try to understand why these things happen.
This here is a pic of how a field looks after a crop raid by wild boars.
My plantation in is Tamil Nadu. We have easy access to textile products. In Kerala, they'll cost a lot more. Hope you guys have got a rough understanding of the hardships outside your cities!
My plantation in is Tamil Nadu. We have easy access to textile products. In Kerala, they'll cost a lot more. Hope you guys have got a rough understanding of the hardships outside your cities!
