“Those who have never seen a leopard under favourable conditions in his natural surroundings can have no conception of the grace of movement, and beauty of colouring, of this the most graceful and the most beautiful of all animals in our Indian jungles.”¯ Jim Corbett, Man-Eaters of Kumaon

Wildlife researchers say that in tiger-dominated forests, the leopards — smaller in build — keep a very low profile.

If we went by this theory, the leopards in the suburbs of Madras were lucky as there were never any tigers in this part of the State. Thus, the scrub jungles on the southern fringes of the city came to be known as leopard country. These majestic spotted animals still continue to come out of their habitat and encounter humans, who have encroached into what were once their lands. Given the fear the movement of a leopard causes among people, the outcome for the cats, more often than not, is rather unfortunate – they are trapped in cages and find themselves in a zoological park.

S. Subburayalu, former Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, who served in the city, says Vandalur and its surroundings always had leopards. In those days, they would come out whenever there was a disturbance in their natural habitat, or if there was water scarcity.

Recalling the incident of a leopard straying onto the airfield at the old airport in Meenambakkam in February 1983, Mr. Subburayalu says they received a complaint from the airport police and security personnel that a wild animal strayed into the north-western sector of the airfield. Following this, a team of forest officials combed the Cowl Bazaar and Manappakkam areas, but the animal could not be traced, he says.

Later the Forest officials did a reconnaissance using the aircraft of the Madras Flying Club. However, the animal could not be sighted. It was later identified as a black leopard, which the officials tried hard to, but failed to trap. Similarly, in 2002 a leopard from the wild strayed into the Vandalur zoo. Authorities had to keep the zoo closed for a month, he recalls. The movement of leopards continues in the urban areas near the city even today.

“In those days, human habitations were not located so close to the Reserved Forest boundaries. So there was not much of man-animal conflict. This is one of the reasons for increased human-animal conflicts today,” he adds.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / P. Oppili / Chennai, July 31st, 2014