On the scent of a serpent

Masi and Vadivel were new to the subtropical swamps of Florida’s Everglades National Park. Walking through the heat and humidity, they looked intently at the ground, searching for tiny clues. When they saw the faint tracks of something that had slithered on the grass, they said, “Rattlesnake.”

In a few silent seconds, the two men had compared the width of the snake’s body with the faint signs of the belly scales and realised that the scales were too long to belong to a python. The real surprise, though, was that Masi and Vadivel had seen neither the pythons nor the rattlesnakes of the Everglades before. They are members of the Irula tribe who are found predominantly in the coasts of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, and are known for their impressive understanding of snakes.

“The Irulas are the most skilled tribals in the world in catching snakes,” says the herpetologist Romulus Whitaker, who has worked with them for about 50 years. Until 1972, the Irulas captured snakes for their skin, selling them to tanners, who then processed the leather for export to Europe and the US. Snake skin was popularly used in the fashion industry, especially the distinctively patterned spectacled cobra or Russell’s viper — the two most venomous snakes in India.

“Only those who are fearless work with snakes,” says Susila, an Irula woman who lives in Chengalpattu in coastal Tamil Nadu. Irula children traditionally accompanied their parents into the forest, and gained an enormous amount of tacit knowledge about plants, animals, herbal medicine and snakes.

Though the origins of the community’s association with snakes is unclear, they leave no one in doubt about their understanding of these reptiles.

“Irulas work in silence,” says Janaki Lenin, a writer and publisher with a special interest in wildlife. She has lived near the community for many years. “They can work for hours before taking a short break to assess the area.” In a few sentences, they convey whether the area is worth exploring before moving on. Other than that, they rarely talk to each other while hunting.

Venom to the rescue: The Irula cooperative, set up in 1978, is involved with venom extraction and supplies to six anti-venom manufacturers across India

Lenin had accompanied Masi and Vadivel to Florida, where the Americans tried to understand the Irulas’ method for tracking snakes. During forays into the wilderness, they asked Lenin to translate their questions to the Irulas. “(The Irulas) were getting impatient,” says Lenin. “It was hunting time.”

No snake’s too foreign for them

Masi and Vadivel were in the US this summer to help hunt an invasive species — Burmese pythons. These giant snakes were probably imported into the US as exotic pets before they either escaped or were released into the warm sub-tropical waters near Florida. “They are everywhere,” says Lenin. “The point of trying to control them is long gone.”

But the Everglades has many endangered water birds and rodents living in small pockets of land, and they could easily become prey to the pythons. The Irulas’ work may help in conserving these species.

“It is hard to learn from them,” says Lenin. Whitaker still finds it hard to see the tracks on the ground that the Irulas are effortlessly studying. “We are just too old to learn those skills,” adds Lenin, “It seems to be a skill that is developed when children follow their parents around and watch hundreds and hundreds of snakes being caught.”

Lenin was initially concerned about the safety of the Irulas in Florida. The topography and ecology of the Everglades is vastly different from the drylands in coastal Tamil Nadu. Venomous water snakes, rattlesnakes, and the Burmese pythons are all species that the Irulas do not encounter back home.

“In a completely new place, I thought they would have to make a conscious effort and I would be able to learn along with them,” says Lenin.

Experts on the job: Masi (extreme right) and Vadivel (third from right) with a Burmese python they tracked and caught in Florida

However, the translation of their skills was near-seamless. They watched a few videos of rattlesnakes, observed some pythons in captivity, and handled some shed skin.

While they were observing the skin, there was no conversation. Lenin recollects that she could see their minds working but there was no overt discussion. “What they thought of it, nobody knew.”

Masi and Vadivel then went into bushes in the national park and often came out covered in cobwebs. They spent hours in the humid heat tracking down every minute sign of a snake. Their in-depth knowledge and incredible hard work made them more effective than thermal sensing drones, trained sniffer dogs and hunters with sophisticated guns.

Living on venom

This may be the last generation of Irulas that has this skill with snakes, though. The hunting of snakes is banned in India. In 1978, Whitaker helped set up a collective that dealt with snake venom. “The Irula cooperative is based on capturing wild snakes and extracting venom four times before releasing them,” says Whitaker.

The venom supplied by the cooperative is used by six companies across India to generate antivenom for treating snakebites.

The venom cooperative only employs a small percentage of the Irulas, and even that work may slowly dry up.

Recent research into snake venom suggests that there is immense variability in their protein structures. If antivenom is generated using the venom of snakes caught in Tamil Nadu, it may not be completely effective in treating snakebites in other parts of the country. In some areas of Maharashtra, there appears to be variability even between snakes found in different districts. Therefore, it may become necessary to breed a genetically diverse range of captive snakes for their venom. The Irulas, however, specialise in capturing snakes, not rearing them.

Many in the community also desire to join the mainstream. A large percentage of their children now attend school. Their parents aspire to work in private firms or government offices. Some continue with other traditional occupations such as selling shrimp or working in brick kilns, rice mills, and as agricultural labourers. There is also a long history of prejudice and discrimination that makes the Irulas want to shed their tribal tag.

“At the beginning, I was this guy, total outsider, saying that your tribal identity is fantastic,” says Whitaker, talking about his initial idealism. Though they listened politely, the Irulas realised that it didn’t translate into tangible benefits. When their basic livelihood became threatened by the Wildlife Act of 1972, and even collecting plants from the forest became illegal, Whitaker realised that integration with the mainstream was important.

Now an Irula Women’s Society liaises between the government and the community. They are obtaining ownership papers for the poromboke (village commons) lands that they have traditionally occupied. The Society is also helping its members become literate, have information about their basic rights and welfare schemes of the government.

The cards are still stacked against them, though. Their skin colour (the word ‘Irula’ is derived from the Tamil word for darkness) and appearance often work against them when they look for jobs in a society that is still largely colour-conscious. “It is unfortunate, but the mainstream is still a distant vision for many,” says Whitaker.

Lenin also stresses the need to find a system that will allow the Irulas to retain their traditional skills while also pursuing formal education in school. “We were wondering if there wasn’t a way of combining the two, like in Mongolia and other places where there are nomads,” she says. However, the Irulas are a scattered community, living in small pockets, and have no discernible social hierarchy or structure. “I don’t know how it would work,” admits Lenin.

The community gets sporadic moments of recognition, as it did when Masi and Vadivel were hunting pythons in Florida. As time goes by, though, most Irulas may settle for a more familiar hunting process — for jobs as clerks, shopkeepers or drivers.

Yasaswini Sampathkumar is a writer based in Chennai

Published on October 19, 2018