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FieldworkFieldworkTHE BANGLADESH PYTHON PROJECTTHE BANGLADESH PYTHON PROJECT

INSIDE THE WILDS OFLAWACHARA

Volunteers from all over the world join in a yearly field workshop to help conserve the extraordinary biodiversity of a National Park. And you can be one of them

Volunteers from all over the world join in a yearly field workshop to help conserve the extraordinary biodiversity of a National Park. And you can be one of them

INSIDE THE WILDS OFLAWACHARA

HEREGOOGLE EARTH COORDINATES HERE

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The Asian Forest Tortoise Manouria emys phayrei is one of 25 species of freshwater turtles and tortoises found in Bangladesh - almost 10% of the global diversity ofchelonians. Unfortunately, 18 of these, including this M. emys, are threatened with extinction. On the title page, a juvenile Burmese Python Python molurus bivittatus.

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TEXT AND PHOTOS BY SCOTT TRAGESER

A beautiful juvenile Bengal Monitor Lizard Varanus bengalensis - a common lizard, yet seldom seen due to its quick and alert nature.

eep inside the Indo-Burmabiodiversity hotspot lays a hidden jewelwith a unique and diverse confluence ofwildlife: Lawachara National Park. Thisincredible region is st i l l relativelyunexplored by researchers, meaningthat many of its cryptic denizens stillremain to be acknowledged by science.In a recent exploration of the Park underthe purview of the Bangladesh PythonProject, an independent research effort,some new light was shed on a few ofthese rare and novel creatures. As onecould expect, during these surveys manyother charismatic creatures wereencountered and subsequent lyphotographed; al l in an effor t toshowcase the importance of maintainingthe protection that the park offers to itsmany endangered hosts.

Caesar Rahman, a Dhaka resident andrising conservationist, is the headherpetological researcher working inLawachara. With the help of CARINAM,he has become a hero for its scaly, oft-overlooked residents. As with al lresearch though, time and money isneeded to make progress, and securingthese necessi t ies can be the mostchallenging part. This is where theparticipants of the “Bangladesh PythonProject Workshop” come to the rescue.Heralding from Australia, America,

India, and Bangladesh, these dedicatedvolunteers came for ten days to lend ahand surveying the area and to learnabout the research and techniquesinvolved with the Project.

In July of 2013, Caesar and I implantedradio-transmitters into three BurmesePythons Python bivitattus to track thislocally endangered species’ movementsand to learn how they are utilizing thehuman-altered landscape of LawacharaNational Park. Many of the pythonshave home ranges that occur in healthyforest but also overlap with teaplantations and even vi l lagers’backyards. This poses a problem if weare going to help increase their numbersin the park. Villagers don’t respond wellto pythons eating their chickens andducks, and won’t hesitate to elevate thevalue of their livelihoods over that of thesnakes’. It also poses an interestingquestion for the project: how exactly arethe pythons utilizing this ever-changingand ever-diminishing landscape? Themost important data we hope to acquireis their day- to-day and seasonalmovement patterns. This is what weneed to know in order to determine whatenvironmental factors the pythonsrequire so that one day the villagers canpeacefully co-exist with these apexpredators.

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A portrait of what is possibly one of the rarest inhabitants of the Sundarbans, the Northern River Terrapin Batagur baska. None have been observed in the wildfor several years but during our surveys in the coming summers, hopefully this will change. Notice the mosquito coming in for a landing!

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One of Bangladesh’s most adorable creatures: the beautifully marked Phayre’s Leaf-monkey Trachypithecus phayrei, a denizen of the forest canopy.

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Finding Elongated tortoises Indotestudo elongata in the forest is near-impossible without the aid of dogs or a radio transmitter such as this one.

A similar question also applies to theElongated Tortoise Indotestudo elongata,which the project has recently expandedto include. Very few of these tortoises stillexist in the park and, like the python, arestill considered a delicacy for manyvi l lagers. Though, thanks to theeducational outreach efforts of Caesar’steam, the locals in the surroundingvil lages are slowing beginning tounderstand the importance of coexistingwith these animals. The word wasquickly spread that we were looking fortortoises and with a little bit of luck,Caesar got a call that a child in thevillage of Baghmara had found one rightbefore our team was to arrive. Two othertortoises from a nearby forest were alsosaved from the soup pots of a ruralmarket in order to test the feasibility of atranslocation effort. Mortality rates canbe high when relocating reptiles butfortunately, our introductions have gonebetter than anticipated with everyindividual surviving, sans one poachingvict im. Health of the animals wasobviously a concern, thus the introducedtortoises were thoroughly checked toensure no diseases were being broughtin. Along with radio-tracking, dailyforest sur veys were conducted todiscover what treasures the forest had instore for us.

Towards the end of our expedition, oneof the locally hired trackers stumbled

upon a new python whilst routinelytracking one of our transmit teredindividuals. Unfor tunately wediscovered that this python had beenrelocated by the forest department afew months prior after rescuing it from aproperty some distance away. With alimited number of transmitters availableto use, we have to be picky about whichsnakes we track. In this case Caesardecided to only insert a less costly PITtag, as her habits would not be thesame as a resident python’s and thuslynot as useful to the python study. If weencounter her again though, the PIT tagwill tell us exactly who she is and datacan still be taken.

Ten days in the jungle can take its toll onyou so we end the workshop with aleisurely boat ride down the legendarySundarbans: the world’s largestmangrove system. Three days ofnormally cost -prohibitive birding,mammaling, and herping accompaniedby good food and good company.

As the workshop is an annual event,every summer there are severalopportunities for enthusiastic individualsto lend their hand at helping to save theherpetofauna of Bangladesh. If thisinterests you, spots for June are stillavailable so please don’t hesitate tocontact Scott Trageser atTrageser.scott@gmail.com. .

One of the great classic tales of mimicry in nature belongs to Gray’s leaf insect Phyllium bioculatum.

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Red-tailed Bamboo Pitviper Trimeresurus erythrurus are one of the more common snakes in most Asian rainforests. Normally found crossing the road after a heavy rain.

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Smith's Leaf-litter Frogs Leptobatrachium smithi in amplexus, off to find a suitable site to deposit their eggs.

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An Orange Blister Beetle Mylabris pustulata taking flight.

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Red-tailed Bamboo Pitviper Trimeresurus erythrurus. This child in the village of Bagmara saved this tortoise from certain death.

Participants inserting a PIT tag in a Burmese Python Python molurus bivittatus. This Micryletta was one of two potentially new species discovered during 2014.

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Day and night, throughout the forests of Southeast Asia, one can hear Tokay Geckos Gekko gecko from hundreds of meters away calling “Tow-Kay, Tow-Kay!”

A fierce persona masks this arboreal, rear-fanged Gray Cat Snake’s Boiga siamensisrather benign bite.

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Ganges River Dolphins Platanista gangetica and Irrawaddy Dolphins wereencountered several times during our three days in the Sundarbans.

Assam Snail Eaters Pareas monticola, like all Pareas, specialize oneating snails and exhibit jaw adaptations to assist with the shucking.

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The sexually dimorphic and endangered Western Hoolock Gibbon Hoolock hoolock is one of five species of primate that we see every trip.

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Elongated Tortoises Indotestudo elongata were once very common colonists of the forest leaf-litter, but decades of unsustainable hunting has decimated their populations.