Government buildings and residential neighborhoods in New Delhi, India, have been taken over by out-of-control, voracious rhesus macaques. These animals have lost homes due to unbridled urbanization. As a result, they have moved in hordes to wherever food is available.
They thieve on food. Not only that — also mobile phones and documents from government offices. The situation has been quite alarming but understandable for a group of species deprived of their natural habitat.
In the past, farmers sought a solution to this. They displayed enormous stuffed-tigers to scare them away. A farmer named Srikanth Gowda, in Karnataka, India, followed suit.
Initially, it worked but only for about a week. When the sun’s rays caused the color of the toy to fade, these hungry furry creatures were back.
The tiger-toy surely did not do the work. The howler monkeys came back to feast on the farmer’s crops. Gowda thought about another way to overcome this problem.
That’s when he remembered another farmer who used real dogs painted with stripes to resemble tigers. Gowda began to do the same with his Labrador Bulbul.
For the time being, it seems to be effective. Gowda uses hair dye on his Labrador, which lasts for a week.
He and his guard dog patrol the fields in the morning and at night. From the primates’ faces, they seem to be very fearful. Gowda’s agricultural land is untouched for now.
Other farmers are now dyeing their canines to look like tigers, and this has stopped the stealing furry creatures from doing the misdeed. Paradoxically, monkeys are known for their mischiefs, but they still can’t tell that this is a trick.
As for Bulbul and the rest of the canines who serve as scarecrows, we hope that tigers will not be enamored by these painted dummy creatures.
Source: Hindustan Times via YouTube
