PARK DIARIES

My days with
Val Geist

Val in front of his home

When legendary minds like Dr Val Geist and Dr A.J.T. Johnsingh

meet, their exchanges become invaluable conservation lessons
for the future.
TEXT AND IMAGES: DR A.J.T. JOHNSINGH, NATURE CONSERVATION
FOUNDATION; WWF-INDIA AND CORBETT FOUNDATION.

58   SAEVUS   JUNE - AUGUST 2019

“Johnsingh, let us freeze among
those rocks and watch animals”, these
were the words whispered to me by
Dr Val Geist as we walked past a
clump of large rocks just to the west
of Bandipur tourism complex. There
were chital, langur and peafowl feeding
around those rocks. It was a winter day
in 1977. I was doing my field research
on the dholes in Bandipur Tiger Reserve
and Val, eminent Canadian Wildlife
Biologist in the Faculty of Environmental
Design in Calgary, had come to Bandipur
Tiger Reserve to carry out a month-long
study on the chital or spotted deer.
Professor Madhav Gadgil had facilitated
his visit. Val with Burrea and his trophies

TAKING A PICTURE OF THE

SAMBAR DEER
One task undertaken by Val in Bandipur
was to teach ungulate behaviour to
H.C. Sharat Chandra, one of Gadgil’s
students, who had been studying chital
in the Reserve. Whenever I had free time,
I used to sit next to Sharat and listen
in rapt attention to Val, who gradually
developed an interest in my research
on dholes. Our friendly relationship
grew stronger when he listened to my
everyday experiences in the jungle which
included my encounters with elephants,
leopards and tigers while I was on foot.
One day he told me that he would like
to take a picture of sambar deer which
reminded him of the elk in North America
which he, being a hunter, had shot many.
As my study area was small (20-30 sq.
km.) I knew almost all the bushes where
sambar used to rest and even knew the
route they used to take when flushed
out of cover. So, with the aim of taking
a picture of the sambar, we went out
that winter morning when Val made the
opening remarks of this story, ‘Johnsingh
let us freeze among those rocks and
watch animals’. Thereafter, we headed
straight to Karigowdana katte (a rain-fed
waterbody), a little over a kilometre from
Bandipur. The katte had a high bund on
its southern side which was overgrown
With Tor
with Lantana and rainwater accumulated
PARK DIARIES

conference representing the Wildlife

Institute of India, where I had joined in
March 1985 as a faculty. After joining
the Institute, I had initiated a study on
the goral in the nearby Rajaji National
Park in the company of my wonderful
colleagues, GS Rawat and SP Goyal.
During the study, I also managed to
take some interesting and rare first-time
pictures of the goral and as it was a
little-studied species, my presentation
in Camerino unexpectedly won the
best presentation award and a cash
price of US$ 1000/00 instituted by the
Oasis Wildlife Magazine ! Val and Simon
Stuart from the IUCN were part of the
committee that selected mine as the
best presentation and they possibly
played a key role in me getting the
award!
The goose and the ganders which followed us

north of the bund. South of the bund

there was a deep nallah overgrown with
bushes and the nallah was a favoured
place for sambar.
On reaching the location and
after making sure that there were no
elephants around, I made Val to hide
behind a large Flame of the forest tree
(Butea frondosa) which was about
60m. to the east of the nallah. Then I
silently went around the waterbody and
approached the nallah from the west
and clapped my hands when I was about
20m. from the nallah. This flushed out
four healthy adult female sambar, which
ran along their regular trail past the
B. frondosa tree. Val, well-hidden behind
the tree, took 2-3 pictures as the deer
ran past him. Few minutes later when
I enquired whether the pictures will be
good, his reply was, ‘Wish I had brought
my bow and arrow as I could have easily
shot one. They were very close as they
ran past me!” An article written on him
mentions that he loves to hunt, hike,
fish, garden, brew and cook.

MOUNTAIN UNGULATE
CONFERENCE
After my Bandipur days, the next time
I had the opportunity to meet him was
in September 1989 during the World
Conference on Mountain Ungulates
in Camerino, Italy.I had gone to the Mike Steini with the salmon he gifted to us

60   SAEVUS   JUNE - AUGUST 2019

Val with a large stuffed wolf in Mike Steini’s lab

WILDLIFE 61
PARK DIARIES

The author and Val in front of an ancient Western red cedar

He believes that wolves and large ungulates cannot survive together.

He declared that the story of the recovery of ungulate population and
vegetation in Yellowstone National Park was a fairy tale as moose
population had drastically declined, elk-fearing wolves ranged near
human habitation and got infected by brucellosis from livestock and
only bison was holding its ground against wolves.

BANFF AND JASPER NATIONAL
PARKS
Years rolled by and our next meeting
was in July 1992 when as part of the
collaborative programme between the
United States Fish and Wildlife Service
(USFWLS) and the Wildlife Institute of
India, I was sent on a study tour to see
wildlife habitats in Switzerland and
North America. Possibly as part of an
agreement with USFWLS, Val took me
to Banff and Jasper National Parks. On
the first day of our travel from Calgary,
where he was living and teaching in the
University, we stopped by the side of a
picturesque lake, sat on a meadow and
had our meal of meat, fruits and a cake
which he had brought from home. Before
giving me an apple, he skinned it saying
that one should always skin and eat the
apple as usually the fruit is grown with
the heavy use of pesticide.
While giving me my share of meat
he said that meat and fruits were the
best foods for human stomach as when
we were hunter-gatherers in the past
largely ate only fruits and meat. He

62   SAEVUS   JUNE - AUGUST 2019

also continued saying that meat and
fruits were the major diet of the Red
Indians. During our conversation, his
admiration for the strength, courage and
the knowledge of the jungle-craft of the
Indians emerged very strongly as he said
that, “Leave a Plains Indian (Red Indian)
naked in his landscape and within a
month he would have acquired a horse,
a bow and an arrow and would be fully
clothed with the pelt of an animal”.
VAL’S HOME, PORT ALBERNI
In June-July 2017 when I was visiting my
younger son in Seattle, I was tempted
to visit Val who, by this time, had been
widowed and having served in Calgary
for 27 years, had resettled to Port
In front of a giant Douglas fir
Alberni in Vancouver Island in 1995.
Val welcomed me to visit him in June
for around a week and so from Seattle,
I went to Vancouver by train and then
flew to Comox airport where a cheerful
and happy Val welcomed me with the
hug of a grizzly. As we reached his home,
his pet dog Burrea, a breed of Papillon,
rushed towards us with immense joy
and welcomed us barking, whining,
whimpering, jumping and running
around us. The bear-like Tor, of a herding
dog breed originating in Flanders,
Belgium was kept chained in an
enclosure and it barked and whined to
show his happiness and displeasure at
being restrained. Four snow-white geese
(a goose and three ganders) quacked
and marched behind us as we left the car
and entered the house.
The spacious house with three
bedrooms, a large hall with several of
his trophies, a spacious kitchen and
a verandah, now maintained by the
80-year Val alone, overlooked a well-
wooded property. Val mentioned that
cut-throat trout, steelhead trout and
and silver salmon creeks flowed through
his property. As a gracious host, he led
me to a table in the hall on which there
were varieties of nuts, dark chocolates
and to the kitchen with a fridge laden
with strawberries, apples, boiled eggs,
bacon and sliced beef. On the stove,
there was a heavy pot where brisket
soup was getting heated. Serving me a
WILDLIFE 63
PARK DIARIES
On a beach of the Pacific ocean
cup of the soup he said that it was the
best antidote for cold and fever. He also
showed packets of venison obtained
from two black-tailed deer, which he
was allowed to shoot every year in and
around his property. After having a
sumptuous dinner along with wine, we
sat down on the couch and talked about
conservation till it was close to midnight.
WOLVES, HYDATID DISEASE
AND CHRONIC WASTING
DISEASE
With Burrea seated on Val’s lap, his
narration on conservation and life in
general was like an enjoyable story-
telling session. Val was born in Russia
but raised in Germany and Austria.
The famous Austrian zoologist Konrad
Lorenz was one of his guides and
mentors. During the conversation, he
expressed his strong view that regulated
hunting was the foundation of the North
American model of wildlife conservation.
He said that in the past, in the
64   SAEVUS   JUNE - AUGUST 2019
Canadian wilderness there were about
60,000 trappers and they regularly killed
wolves and bears and so there were no
attacks on people by wolves as wolves
were afraid of people. As the predator
population was under control there was
an abundance of ungulate prey such as
various species of deer, elk and moose
and the wolves that were surviving were
pure Darwinian species (Canis lupus),
very large, healthy and shy of people. He
was of the opinion that the use of axe
(to cut down and remove weeds), fire
(cool season burning to promote growth
of protein-rich tender grass and to ward
off disastrous summer fires) and gun
(to eliminate problem animals and for
hunting) should be followed in wildlife
conservation.
When I asked Val whether he was
against wolves, he said that he was not
against wolves but against the policy
of reintroduction of hybrid wolves in
areas where there were domestic dogs
and coyotes. As all these canids have
70 chromosomes they could easily
hybridize and these introductions were
producing coywolf (hybrids between
coyote and wolf ). Val opined that the
wolf population is not controlled as it
was in the past and as there is less prey
in their habitats, they look for livestock,
visit garbage dumps, come in contact
with people and even start attacking
dogs and people.
He believes that wolves and large
ungulates cannot survive together. He
declared that the story of the recovery
of ungulate population and vegetation
in Yellowstone National Park was a fairy
tale as moose population had drastically
declined, elk-fearing wolves ranged near
human habitation and got infected by
brucellosis from livestock and only bison
was holding its ground against wolves.
Now his major worry about wolves
is its potential to cause and spread
the terrible parasitic hydatid disease.
Echinococcus granulosus is the dog
tapeworm found in the wolves, whose
eggs if ingested by humans, can
cause the hydatid disease. So, he is
totally against wolves infected with the
tapeworm hunting elk and deer nearer
to human habitation and defecating in
the vicinity of human settlements which
can result in the spread of the hydatid
disease.
Another concern of his was the
spread of Chronic Wasting Disease
(CWD) which was first detected in a
captive mule deer in 1967 in Fort Collins.
The disease is caused by a prion (protein
infectious particle), most commonly
found in the central nervous system but
capable of spreading to the peripheral
nervous system and therefore affecting
the muscle. According to Val, the major
reason for CWD not being prevalent in
British Columbia so far, as it occurs in
Idaho in the south, is because trappers
continue to remove wolves at a fairly
high rate aided by predator control
officers and because there is an open
season for all hunters to shoot wolves
if encountered. Clinical signs in the
deer after being infected by CWD are
salivation and increased thirst, ensuing
frequent urination and reduced feed
intake resulting in weight loss and
eventual death. Stags may suffer more
 Regarding the black bear, he said that the bears have the habit of
raiding his apple trees and grapevines. Whether it was day time or
night, whenever the bear visited, alerted by his dogs, he would go
out of his house with his Browning Pump Shot Gun and look for the
bear. He said if it was a solitary female or a young male bear, it would
usually run away seeing him walking towards it. If it was a large male
or an aggressive bear it would stand its ground and by clapping its
teeth would make a hideous sound to frighten him.
from CWD and so a large-scale death of ENCOUNTERS WITH BEARS invariably made the bear run away. He
stags can be a great loss to an economy One night I asked Val whether he, said if a male was frightened in such
which gets a substantial amount of having worked in grizzly and black bear a way seldom did it come back to his
money through trophy hunting. Val is country for decades, had any unnerving garden again!
also of the opinion that wolves by killing encounter with either black bear or
and completely devouring the carcasses grizzly. His story of a close encounter VENISON AND AU REVOIR
can help in controlling spread of the with a mother grizzly was hair-raising. On the penultimate day of my departure,
disease. So far there are no known During the beginning of his mountain- Val asked whether I could cook a packet
cases of CWD in humans but crab- sheep study, one night he was trekking of black-tail deer venison the south
eating macaques (Macaca fascicularis), all by himself to his camp with a Indian way as he vividly remembered
with genes similar to humans, when rucksack which weighed around 40 kg. the mutton I had cooked for him in
experimentally infected with CWD, have It was a beautiful moonlit night and in Bandipur 40 years ago. He had all the
died. one turning of the trail he met a grizzly spices and the cooked venison smelled
mother with a cub. On seeing Val, the and tasted so good that he requested
CATHEDRAL GROVE mother grizzly came roaring and charged me to write down the recipe for him. He
I also had the chance to accompany at him. Val raised his rucksack over his saved it safely and said that when his
Val on a walk in Cathedral grove, go head, made himself appear much bigger family, his two sons and daughter would
on a drive to the Pacific National Park than the grizzly, screamed louder than come together around Christmas, he
and to the Stamp River where using the grizzly and charged. The grizzly ran would use the recipe and cook a curry
the fish ladder more than 40 million away leaving the cub! Next day, the first for everyone.
salmon, lampreys and other fish such thing Val did was to go town and buy The time to leave Val had come and
as steelhead migrate effortlessly to the a rifle which was his close companion I told him that visiting and staying with
spawning grounds in the Upper Stamp during the rest of his period in the him would remain green in my memory
River and the Great Central Lake. mountains. for a long time and he too said that he
Cathedral Grove in MacMillan Regarding the black bear, he said that would remember my visit for a long
Provincial Park is an area of 301 ha. the bears have the habit of raiding his time to come. While leaving me in the
established on 27th February 1947. It is apple trees and grapevines. Whether Comox airport he hugged me once again
a park of giant trees, most of them being it was day time or night, whenever like a grizzly and with tears in my eyes I
Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziersi). the bear visited, alerted by his dogs, said goodbye to him and walked towards
Another species important for the he would go out of his house with his the plane hoping to visit him again in
natives and which grows to magnificent Browning Pump Shot Gun and look the near future. His words, that axe, fire
size is the Western red cedar (Juniperus for the bear. He said if it was a solitary and gun are vital in wildlife management
virginiana). Douglas fir gets its generic female or a young male bear, it would continue to ring in my ears even today.
name from Scottish born botanist David usually run away seeing him walking
Douglas (1799-1834) who had identified towards it. If it was a large male or Acknowledgements:
over 200 new plant species in North an aggressive bear it would stand its Thanks to Dr Naveen Pandey for reading
America. David died under mysterious ground and by clapping its teeth would through the article and Mervin Johnsingh
circumstances while climbing Mauna Kea make a hideous sound to frighten for editing the pictures.
in Hawaii at the very young age of 35. him. Val, in an erect posture (so that
At the place of his death, a small stand he looked much bigger than the bear!)
of Douglas-fir trees has been planted. would slowly walk towards the bear and
About 50 plant species and one genus with the repeated action of the bolt of
bear the name of this botanist making his gun, would make clapping sounds
his name immortal. louder than that of the bear which

WILDLIFE 65