Wild Cries

  Trailblazers of British India’s Forestry   The trailblazers in human, academic, scientific and religious freedom have always been nonconformists - Martin Luther King, Jr. Prelude It has been quite some months since my last posting in www.wildcries.com. Not that there were paucity of engaging themes but other personal engagements put off my desire to pen my thoughts. It is heartening though to notice that my previous posts have touched about 85000 views world over so far.      On a morning a fortnight ago, I opened the WhatsApp message box from one of my retired IFS colleagues from Tamil Nadu, India Thiru V.Ganesan who has recollected the 205th birth anniversary of an outstanding British forester who served the Madras Presidency among his several other positions he held in the British Empire forest service. The date was 9th August that happened to be the birth day of Dr.H.F.C.Cleghorn in 1820. Reminiscing on the message and as a professional deeply interested...

‘It is one world. And it’s in our care. For the first time in the history of humanity, for the first time in 500 million years, one species has the future in the palm of its hands’-  David Attenborough, noted British broadcaster and biologist Opening note Residents in my area turn up in the streets with their waste buckets containing meticulously segregated wet and dry home waste so as to deposit it in the garbage collection vehicle that appear regularly in the early morning since last ten years or so. Door-to-door collection of domestic garbage has become order of the day in most of all the urban areas for which a solid waste management fee is levied on the residents. Environmental consciousness hasn’t however penetrated deep into the society in the entire spectrum of solid waste management system albeit the existence of legal framework for the same in India.  As an avid traveller, I am pained to notice the mounts of urban domestic waste along the highways that unfailingly ma...

No matter how far you have gone down the wrong road, turn back-  Turkish Proverb Is the above proverb appropriate in the current context, with the installation of new generation directional and information signage along our roads? Readers may draw a lesson or two from the paper in the following pages. About my Blog It has been two years since I have been writing in www.wildcries.com and I have posted around 22 blog papers till October 2023. About 35,000 readers from a dozen nationalities have gone through the episodes and some of them posting their comments on the papers. With sustained interest and support from my readers, I intend to continue my writing on themes that will be of appeal to forestry, wildlife and environmental professionals and enthusiasts. All Roads lead to Rome It is recorded that during the course of Rome’s history, a vast network of some 250,000 miles of roads were built at the height of the Roman Empire connecting the capital to all parts of the Empire, so muc...

Nature in her green, tranquil woods heals and soothes all afflictions – John Muir, American Naturalist It has been quite some time since I posted my previous blog paper from the USA. I had to get away from my pressing personal engagements to snatch some moments to put together my random thoughts on one of the most important aspects of ensuring environmental amelioration in our urban settings. That is the subject of protecting the existing heritage trees in urban areas and augmenting urban green spaces (UGS).   Urbanization trend across the globe is keeping a fast pace, of course, for valid economic and social reasons. Cities and towns develop along with a host of environmental challenges that stem from high human densities, enhanced per capita consumption of resources, commensurate generation of wastes of all sorts and consequent environmental crisis. Human health implications from unplanned expansion of urban centers without adequate green space are huge. Urban forestry inclu...