Rali Forest - Our brief visit.

Small contours of Rali Forest could be seen from quite a distance as we drove past the fields. Kadem canal’s extension work was in progress, soon we parked jeep and crossed the canal to venture into the forest.

Rali Forest.

 

Our team.

The Forest on other side of canal is good enough with occasional felling.
The climb was rocky and difficult. Wild dogs scats were seen. Also a Leopard scat was found soon.

Once we reached the top of the plateau the forest was better and thicker.
Human presence was absent, although weeds show that cattle do come here, parthenium had occupied the vast plateau.

Water Hole.

We walked on a significant game trail and soon we hit a small rocky hill.
Our forest floor was only rock now and we found deep holes filled with water.
(similar ones are seen in Deepam banda, Birsaipet)
Few signs of blood were seen near water hole, some slaughter and feast had taken place earlier (some ritual maybe).
But the forest was good around, and some larger termenalia were also seen around here.

Sambar Doe and Fawn droppings.

The deer are predominantly Sambar here, all sambar hoof marks were around us.
Rutting was quite obvious on trees.

Sambar Rutting on trees.

We spend an hour on the plateau, but the team was tired and restless now.
We started to descend, on the descend we found some villagers were around the hills edge.

We climbed down soon and found three men felling with axes.
staff confiscated the axes and we returned to the Jeep.

Forest Type.

Tiger can find good Sambar here, but due to rocky nature of floor (with sharp stones) their longer presence can be doubtful. Although further deep in the forest we need to visit and asses it further.

Note: Rali Block forms one of the critical corridor for Kawal Tiger Reserve.