Waters of Life (Part 1) - Shrinking Habitats

 From information sourced on the ENVIS Hub: Kerala there are more than 18000 public ponds in Kerala, of which some 5400 are in Palakkad district. That accounts for nearly 35% of the total and the rest being distributed in the other 13 districts. Perhaps the major geographical feature, the Palghat Gap, explains this unique richness in small broken waterbodies throughout the district. Many of them are on private land and in the middle of farmed areas or in small wooded grooves. 

Most ponds are now being taken over by the local panchayats and 'renovated' for use by public. These ponds were traditionally used for bathing, washing clothes, bathing cattle, limited irrigation and various other localized uses. Of late the trend is more towards clearing all vegetation in and around the ponds, desilting and deepening them and putting it to use for drinking water storage, wider irrigation purposes or fish farming. The renovated ponds are now restricted zones and protected with fencing along the edges and nets over the water to prevent birds from picking off fish. 

Mercifully there are still a few privately held waterbodies that are a haven for birds and other creatures. One of them, near Polpully, happened to draw my attention as it was on a road I used to take to visit my mother's ancestral 'tharavad'. Why it attracted my attention, I cannot say, but it did. Perhaps the wild and unkempt nature of its edges or the greenish scum floating on the water proved to be the magnet. Anyway, when ever I used to pass by, my head would turn and in a fleeting moment I would see the usual birds that normally haunted such ponds. It never occurred to me that I should stop long enough and scour the area. 

In 2020, as the Covid lockdown progressed and the prolonged confinement was getting on my nerves, I decided to extend my drives to the hospital by taking slightly 'longer' routes! On one such drive, when I happened to be on this particular road, it struck me that a few minutes at the edge of this pond would be worthwhile. What a difference it made to my lockdown! Despite the garbage in the pond including an old disused mattress. 

 

Over the next few months and also during the 2021 lockdown, my friends and I spent many fascinating hours on the edge of this pond observing how life goes on in a place when there is minimal human interference. By comparison the cleaned up ponds were 'sterile' and totally uninteresting. I hope this pond is allowed to remain this way forever and I have reason to think it will, as many local folk, attracted by our presence on its edge regularly, started to take notice of the Life in the Pond!

Eurasian Moorhen

Little grebe

Purple heron

Little grebe

Black-crowned night heron (immature)

Lesser whistling duck

The posts that will follow after this are stories of a few fellow creatures that survive in many such small habitats. Let us hope  a peep into their fascinating lives will encourage protection of at least a few such waterbodies for their survival. Otherwise we humans are the ones that stand to lose from their absence.