It was in 1965 that I heard the first story about wild dogs from a veteran British tea planter. A memsahib was trout-fishing in a remote corner of Munnar when she saw a sambar stag, fleeing from a murderous pack of wild dogs, plunge into the water in a desperate bid to escape. Terrified, the lady promptly followed suit herself — only to be told, on being fished out of the freezing water, that wild dogs have never been known to attack humans.

Nevertheless, given its unsavoury reputation, my fear of the wild dog persisted. A few months later, strolling alone through a tea field fringing Munnar, I espied a couple of tawny-hued canines resolutely heading my way. Taking no chances, I quickly shinnied up the nearest tree, perched myself precariously on a branch and waited with bated breath. Soon the duo came loping down the road, intently sniffing the air. Then one of them spotted me and, to my great relief, they fled immediately — with what appeared to be a look of utter surprise laced with contempt.

The wild dog (Cuon alpinus) is known by a few other names as well — the Indian wild dog, Asiatic wild dog, Red Dog and Dhole. Sporting a tawny-coloured coat and whitish under-parts with a bushy black-tipped tail, it mostly roves the Western Ghats and Eastern Ghats of South India, and is found in Central and North India too. It weighs between 10-20 kg and its litter, numbering between 5 and 12 pups, are born after a gestation period of about two months.

The wild dog is known to be an opportunistic feeder, living off lizards, small rodents, hares, monkeys and ungulates (mostly wild pigs and deer). It has an unusual system of communication that includes whistle-like calls, low growls and even screams. It is listed as an endangered species by the IUCN, primarily because of increasing habitat destruction, depletion of prey base and its killing by farmers who perceive it as a threat to their livestock. Apart from the tiger and panther, the wild dog has few predators in the wild.

This gregarious carnivore hunts co-operatively in small packs with between 5 to 10 members, which are known for their persistence and viciousness when in search of prey. Once targeted, seldom does its prey ever get away — and even if it does, it’s usually too grievously mauled to survive for long. The wild dog is also believed to be the only predator that begins to feed on its prey even before it’s dead, possibly a measure of its ravenousness.

The modus operandi of the pack is simple. The scent of the prey (usually a sambar) is sniffed out and then it’s relentlessly pursued over hill and dale, sometimes for hours on end, until it eventually collapses out of sheer exhaustion, usually near a stream or lake towards which it is cunningly driven. However, before the prey enters the water its pursuers deftly hamstring it, sometimes disemboweling it, and bring it down. Then the voracious feasting starts.

Munnar’s former British tea planters regarded the wild dog as vermin and often shot it at sight — a local planters’ club has a couple of mounted heads on display and I also recall having seen wild dog pelts being used as carpets in some British planters’ bungalows. The apparent justification for this was that the canines were known to cyclically decimate the sambar population which the Brits traditionally hunted for sport. Indeed, in Munnar’s tea estates and the adjacent Eravikulam National Park, the sambar is still the wild dog’s preferred prey. While trekking through the Eravikulam National Park in the late 1980s, I literally stumbled upon no less than ten sambar skeletons in the waist-high grass — the handiwork of wild dogs, my knowledgeable local guide informed me. The bones had been picked clean and bleached white by the sun.

Thankfully, wild dogs have so far not been known to attack humans. If ever they do, it will probably endanger them even more than they are at present — and inevitably result in their being wiped out.

Having spent the better part of my life in Munnar’s fauna-rich hills, I’ve been singularly fortunate to have had several encounters with wild dogs over the years. Sauntering through a tea field lost in thought, I once saw a petrified-looking barking deer zip across my path hardly twenty feet away, followed a few seconds later by two wild dogs hell-bent on running it down — and too preoccupied to notice me. Barely five minutes later agonised squealing heralded the end of a successful chase. I could only pity the poor quarry as I hotfooted it.

On another occasion, having camped overnight in the Eravikulam National Park, a cousin and I set out for a stroll early in the morning — to be greeted by an unforgettable sight that not many have been privileged to witness. On the opposite bank across a fairly wide stream was a pack of six wild dogs ravenously tearing apart a freshly killed sambar stag, its legs sticking up grotesquely. The dogs stopped feeding and eyed us suspiciously for some time; then, reassured that we posed no threat, they continued with their gory meal.

Yet another time while trout-fishing I chanced upon two wild dogs feeding on a sambar carcass, perhaps a day old, on the opposite bank. Seeing me and my gillie, they reluctantly abandoned their meal and melted into the jungle, perhaps hoping we would go away. We stayed put. As expected, one furtively reappeared about ten minutes later and tentatively resumed its meal, seldom taking its eyes off us. Soon enough its companion joined it and for the next half an hour we gazed fascinated at the pair feeding cautiously — all thoughts of fishing forgotten. If only I had had a video camera, I could’ve captured some rarely seen footage on both these occasions. Most intriguing, however, was the recurring phenomenon as to how wild dogs contrive to fell their prey near a stream or lake.

Recently, I viewed a video of some wild elephants successfully fending off persistent attacks on two of their calves by a pack of wild dogs as well as another of a mighty gaur failing to defend its calf against the marauders. Apparently, the size of its adversary doesn’t necessarily seem to deter the doughty wild dog when it’s hungry.

Thankfully, wild dogs have so far not been known to attack humans. If ever they do, it will probably endanger them even more than they are at present — and inevitably result in their being wiped out.