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Where forests reign
But what stood out on this road trip across the central valleys and southern foothills is something not always noticed because it is always present: the extensive and dense forests climbing out of gorges and blanketing the layered hills stretching to the edge of the sky. In the wisdom and foresight of the Bhutanese leadership, this expansive green cover shields the fragile himalayan landscape from erratic weather patterns, regulates snowmelt and monsoon rain that power hydro energy, shelters an incredible diversity of life, and keeps alive the spiritual connection to the land.
Contributed by Phuntsho Wangdi, freelance journalist
Ranger Kinley sniffed the air several times. Then he pinched some dry soil from the ground, raised his arm and slowly released it, observing which way it fell. “It could be a dead python,” he said, dusting his hands, and scanning the undergrowth.
It was a musky odour, and that it could be a python was no surprise. We were in the tropical monsoon forests of the Royal Manas National Park in the south-central foothills, bordering the Indian Manas wildlife sanctuary in the plains of Assam. Here, midday temperatures were stifling even in mid-November.
It was past seven in the morning and sunlight filtered through the patchy and verdant canopy giving the forest an open, airy ambiance. Vines and climbers dangled from branches and trunks to the forest floor strewn with leaves, and with soft rocks in the moist and shaded areas. One particular tree was completely covered with thick brown vines, making its trunk appear much thicker and sturdier than the others. The vines, Kinley said, would eventually strangle the tree and take over.
©Aaron Gekoski / WWF-US
The untamed surroundings sharpened our senses, just as our footsteps awakened hibernating leeches under decaying leaves and disturbed spiders whose webs stretched strategically between low hanging branches of trees.
We were on the Zomrong eco trail, a recent initiative by the park to test its tourism potential, a 2.5 km walk downhill from the Bhutan Tiger Centre to a damp and densely forested area, where a watchtower had been built to observe wildlife. The tower faced a salt lick – an exposed patch of hillside, the colour of ash, that animals lick for essential mineral nutrients to stay healthy.
At the base of the hill, hidden from our view, the emerald Manas river (Drangme Chu) flowed silently through the park. Used by local eco-tourism enterprises for rafting and more recently high-end recreational fly fishing, it was on the last leg of its journey from Bhutan’s mountains to the Indian plains.
No wildlife was spotted in the short time at the watchtower, but a fresh pug mark of a young adult in the wet soil of a brook near the salt lick got the group hush. It could have been one of the 29 tigers counted in Manas during the second national tiger survey in 2022-23, which counted 131 nationwide, a 27% increase from 2015. As an indicator species, increasing tiger numbers signified a healthy biodiversity and the flourishing of many other species. It also meant that conservation efforts were going well.
We did spot bharals concealed high up in the rocky landscapes near a waterfall, and black-faced golden langurs feeding on wild bamboo stalks on our descent from the central district of Trongsa to the hot and humid climes of Zhemgang, the home district of Manas.
But what stood out on this road trip across the central valleys and southern foothills is something not always noticed because it is always present: the extensive and dense forests climbing out of gorges and blanketing the layered hills stretching to the edge of the sky.
©Aaron Gekoski / WWF-US
In the wisdom and foresight of the Bhutanese leadership, this expansive green cover shields the fragile himalayan landscape from erratic weather patterns, regulates snowmelt and monsoon rain that power hydro energy, shelters an incredible diversity of life, and keeps alive the spiritual connection to the land.
Today, this green shield stands at 69 percent, exceeding the 60 percent constitutional mandate, with much of it within the protected areas that span 52 percent of the country, the heart of Bhutan’s conservation strategy. It comprises 10 protected areas connected by nine biological corridors, ‘wildlife highways’ of intact forest cover, forming a five million acre area of forests, rivers and diverse habitats, for wildlife to roam freely, disperse and adapt to climate change.
Now, efforts are on to permanently safeguard the protected areas. Habitats are being restored, regular surveys and scientific research inform conservation and management plans, and nature-based employment opportunities are being created for communities living near the parks.
In Manas, Bhutan’s oldest and most diverse protected area, natural grasslands are regularly cleared of woody and invasive species to attract herbivores - the prey of the big cats - while water holes are maintained, and salt licks are cleared of debris and bushes.
Groundbreaking research on the golden mahseer has led to legalising high-end recreational fly fishing in Manas and its tributaries, creating economic incentives for locals to protect the species.
Rangers are equipped with drones for surveillance and monitoring as well as SMART (Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool) to combat poaching and illegal wildlife trade, which has made “patrolling much more efficient and effective”, says ranger Kinley.
©Aaron Gekoski / WWF-US
This major effort is powered by Bhutan for Life (BFL), an innovative financing solution, initiated by the government and WWF. Launched in 2019, the programme has mobilized diverse donor support to fund conservation efforts over 14 years, giving Bhutan time to establish domestic funding to permanently safeguard the protected areas.
This initiative comes at a critical juncture as aspirations for rapid economic prosperity taking centre stage and pressure mounts to balance conservation with development. Amid moves prioritising logging, mining, and hydropower for growth, this initiative is exploring strategies to monetise conservation efforts such as wildlife tourism.
An even more pressing challenge, one that could erode support from rural communities, essential for conservation success, is human wildlife conflict. While the loss of livestock and crops to wildlife is a problem that rural Bhutan has lived with for ages, today it is seen in the context of efforts to increase wildlife numbers.
In recent years, the village of Jongthang, to the north of Trongsa district, has come to symbolize the complex challenges of conservation efforts, where frequent cattle depredation has tested local tolerance for conservation measures. At the peak of the problem, if Trongsa town was flooded with local beef for sale, it was likely from cattle killed in the nearby villages.
The two hour winding drive along a dirt road from Trongsa town passed through largely unbroken cool broadleaf vegetation in steep and rocky terrain and, from a distance, Jongthang appeared as a clearing on a forested mountainside. Jongthang sits at the base of the Wangchuck Centennial National Park, the country’s largest protected area that stretches to the northern frontiers, and borders a biological corridor. This location, foresters say, makes it particularly vulnerable as big cats coming up from Manas traverse the area to establish their territories.
“I do not understand why they want to increase tiger numbers,” said Sangay, a Jongthang dairy farmer, who lost two cattle to tigers in 2023. “Before, attacks used to happen in the herder camps and pastures in the forests, now it is happening closer to the village.” Sangay has registered eight of his milking cows with an existing insurance scheme supported by the government and conservation partners. His cattle were grazing above his harvested terraced fields, a short distance from the village centre, near his cattle shed - a solid earth rammed structure with no openings except for a large wooden door.
As a community-led solution, solar-powered electric fencing for pastures on private and state land, has brought some relief to Jongthang and is being adopted by other affected villages in Trongsa.
Solar electric fencing is also being used to keep away elephants from farmlands in the southern foothills bordering India. Last fall, village homes in the midst of banana and betel-nut trees had lit small fires and community members of the quick response teams (QRTs) held bright torches and made loud noises to scare away a herd grazing near fallow farmlands.
©Kinley Wangmo / WWF-Bhutan
Despite the threat to life and loss of income, villagers in Jongthang and in the southern foothills, rarely retaliate, restrained largely by reverence for these animals they regard as divine guardians of nature sharing their land. Ranger Kinley Dorji shares this reverence and finds purpose and happiness in the challenging responsibility of being a guardian of the natural world.
Emerging from the Zomzorong trail, we drove a short distance through dense vegetation descending to wide sandy banks of the Manas river. As we squinted in the bright sunlight, waiting for the boat to take us across, the spirit of Bhutan came through in the stillness of the moment, in the sparkling river flowing through the silence of undisturbed forests.
This article was written after a content-gathering trip with WWF-US and WWF-Bhutan to document the nature conservation journey of Bhutan