Living with Cranes
Icons of subcontinental folklore and mentioned in the tales of the Buddha, the Saurus cranes are an integral part of the Terai's ecosystem and natural beauty. Recent development has also left this population reduced and sadly endangered.
A couple square kilometers of the Lumbini Master Plan are set aside as a sanctuary for these Cranes. At the moment the population is around 200. Still, this is a drastic reduction from their former range in the swamps and lakes of the Terai, many of which have been drained as a result of development. And this sanctuary too is under threat. As Lumbini's tourist population grows, plans have been proposed for a billion dollar hotel expansion, built on the sight of the current crane habitat. Budget constraints have kept the sanctuary from being flooded year round, and the usually cranes have been forced to crisscross the Terai in search of ponds.
About a week ago, when I returned from school, there was an injured crane in the yard of the monastery. He was a juvenile, probably less than a year old. Someone had hit him in the leg with a bullet or a stone. Although a taboo prevents hunting, individual cranes are still brought down for sport or meat. Darmendra, who works at the Crane sanctuary, had bandaged his leg and was feeding him fish from a small bag. Sumangelo (our abbot) and I spoke for a while about him. He hoped to get him to a veterinarian in Kathmandu or Bhairhawa, but it was all up in the air. It was hard sight, that crane, head still covered in yearling down, curled up on the grass. When I got back from school the next day the crane had died, and they had buried it in the sanctuary, under a small memorial cairn. Luckily, such incidences of Crane hunting are relatively rare
Of all the photo's of cranes I've taken, I find this image particularly affecting. It was taken at the Vietnamese temple, a huge, almost theme park like devotional site in the Lumbini Monastic zone. They had installed a small pond there, next to a false mountain and a pilgrims hotel. Concrete cranes and other false animals ring the pond, and occasionally real Saurus will find their way there. There is something so tender and sad about this crane, looking for companionship in something visually similar but fundamentally unreachable.
If you want to learn more about the Saurus, and how you can protect their wetlands in the Lumbini master plan from further development, take a look at the Lumbini Social Service Foundation website.
http://servelumbini.org/lumbini-crane/