Interesting accidental connection and an opportunity to help people in India

[Daniel Miller]

Short story.      

  I have a survey that is about predator interaction with ranch livestock near national parks.      It's information will be used to help livestock producers near Desoai National Park in India with problems created by himalayan brown bears and snow leopards.

If you teach near a park and have connections with farmer/ranchers who would be willing to fill out the survey their time would be appreciated.

Survey is attached.  They can be sent back to me here in Columbus by email or mail.  I will send them on to the people using the information collected.

Long Story

My wife works at a jewelry store on the highway between laurel and Red Lodge.   A guy came in about a month ago who was looking for contact information.  He is a wildlife biologist from India who was searching for people around Yellowstone Park who might have predator problems due to the protected wildlife in the region ( the lady he was with wanted to stop at the jewelry store and in talking he mentioned why they were in the region. My wife got interested in what he was doing and made a connection with him).  He has been working with his home community in northern India in the foothills of the himalayans (an area around 9,000 ft elevation).  They are sheep, goat, cattle herdsmen.  In 1993 he was part of starting Deosai National Park to help protect himalayan brown bears (younger man doing bear research). They are now starting to be a problem for the local livestock producers and he is trying to find what has worked in other similar areas of the world to help both the bears and the ranchers.  Apparently the Indian govt. has not given much support to the livestock people and he's wondering if it is worth trying to get them to.  One question was if reimbursement was a valid option or if other things worked as good/better.

He was a guest in our home last evening and we had a great 3 hour talk about agriculture, livestock, wildlife etc.  He is balanced and knowledgeable.  

An odd opportunity to help people we will never see or know.

If you are near a park or wildland area and would be willing to pass this on to your students I would send back to him whatever surveys we can collect. He spent 2 months driving around Montana and Idaho stopping at cafes', gas stations, county fairs etc.  (foreigner with California plates) and only got 30 people who would talk to him and complete a survey.