An insect hovers for a brief moment before settling on a tree, a speck of cerulean gleaming against the ageing wood.
“Spider wasp,” says ecologist and nature educator Vena Kapoor, narrating the fascinating but macabre tale of the spider wasp and its victims. While adult spider wasps mostly feed on flower nectar, making them excellent pollinators, they are also what are known as “parasitoids.” Unlike parasites, they kill their host. In the case of spider wasps, females hunt down spiders, inject them with venom and lay eggs on them. Once they hatch, the larvae eat these spiders alive, inevitably killing them, she tells the huddle of women cloistered around this tree.
Other small groups have fanned across the verdant green expanse of Bengaluru’s Cubbon Park — peering through binoculars, to catch a glimpse of birds, crouching around bushes to observe smaller invertebrates or kneeling on the grass to get a closer look at turf-dwelling fauna.
Every crevice and corner of this historic park, where the 9th edition of the All-Women Nature Walk is taking place, seems to be teeming with life. As we meander through it, we spot, in no particular order, a fragrant frangipani tree, a koel singing plaintively, a jewel-toned narrow-mouthed frog, the nymph of planthopper, and a two-tailed spider with egg-sacs, its dun-hued body blending into the bark beneath it.
Women nature walkers at Cubbon Park. | Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRAGEMENT
A safe space
The initiative, which seeks to offer a safe, inclusive space for women to experience nature, is the brainchild of Misha Bansal and Mittal Gala. “Outdoor spaces are always dominated by men,” says Misha, a nature educator with the Nature Conservation Foundation (NCF).“The idea is to encourage women to occupy outdoor spaces and open a window to nature for them.”
The planning for this walk began sometime last August, says Mittal, Program Manager with Bird Count, India, NCF. It was partly triggered by discussions at their workplace, NCF, where they constantly talk about things like mental health, diversity, inclusivity, and gender biases. “We are conscious of these things, even in our own work and personal lives,” she says. Also, one of her sub-projects at work involved training women birdwatchers to become citizen scientists and contributing to eBird, an online database of observations about birds and their behaviour. “We have data quality reviewers who look at eBird data. Amongst the 150 volunteer data editors we have, only a small percentage are women,” says Mittal. “We wanted to change this.”
White-cheeked Barbet | Photo Credit: Garima Bhatia
This project and conversations at work got her thinking about this skewed gender ratio when it came to activities like birdwatching and what could be done about it. She also found a partner to help address the problem. “I asked Misha if she would like to join me and she immediately said yes,” recalls Mittal.
In September 2023, Misha and Mittal conducted their first all-women bird walk, which garnered an excellent response. “That inspired Misha and me to continue doing this,” says Mittal.
Over time, the bird walk evolved into a nature walk since “we end up observing everything,” says Misha. They also began experimenting with different walk venues and collaborating with other people, inviting experts like Vena Kapoor and Deepa Mohan to co-lead the walks with them. “We are now trying to put more focus on how we want to take this forward,” she says.
Nature walk at Puttenahalli Lake. | Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRAGEMENT
A growing community
The All Women Nature Walks community has now grown considerably, with over 433 members now part of their Whatsapp community. Every walk gets a response from at least 70-80 people and has, on average, around 20 participants. “Very few people have left the group and more are joining,” says Mittal, adding that they have even received requests to conduct walks outside Bengaluru.
So what makes women-only nature walk so distinctive? Misha and Mittal feel that the energy of these walks ends up being very different “In any setting where there are more men than women, women tend to be silent and hesitate to ask questions,” she says. Often, it feels like there is an invisible confidence gap. “Men may often jump right in, while women might take a while to gather their thoughts before speaking up. In a women-only walk they end up being more free,” believes Mittal, who also feels that during these walks, women tend to interact with each other more.
Hamadruas spider species. | Photo Credit: Vena Kapoor
“There is a feeling of togetherness and connection when it is all women…an innate sense of comfort that women have with each other,“ agrees Misha. Women also feel more safe in a group, in her opinion. “When women are in public spaces, we end up having to be aware of many things; in this walk, that barrier goes away,” she says. “Even though it is a public space with all kinds of people, within our group there is a sense of camaraderie.”
Shalini Ukunge, a software engineer and an avid birder, believes this to be “a cosier space where women are not judged by what they know or don’t.” The interactions within the space are warmer and no one is worried about saying something that sounds stupid to other people, she adds, an opinion that Sagarika Jaiswal, a PhD student from IISc, echoes.
“It was a relatively large turnout and people seemed less shy and more amicable,” says Sagarika who has attended one all-women’s nature walk, so far. In her opinion, while nature walks are generally inclusive spaces for sharing knowledge and experiences, such walks could help lure out shy or unsure participants. “It is an initiative in the right direction. I think women and non-binary folks could benefit the most from this, for a start.”
During a nature walk. | Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRAGEMENT
Why go on a nature walk
In 2023, a report titled The State of India’s Birds was released. It provides a periodic assessment of the state of most species of birds in the country – their distribution range, abundance and conservation status. The basis of this report was citizen science data, taken from eBird. The data which include 30 million observations made by 30,000 birdwatchers were analysed for trends in abundance, says Mittal. “They could assess the conservation status of over 900 species of birds and that is the power of citizen science.”
Citizen science, she believes, could play a massive role in the conservation narrative since no single scientist can do what a collective of citizens can do: coming together to gather data at a large scale across multiple geographic landscapes, even learning how to analyse this data, and generate knowledge. “It gives a citizen some sense of pride, the belief that they are doing their bit, contributing to society,” says Mittal.
Red tip butterfly. | Photo Credit: Misha Bansal
More citizen scientists
Nature walks, which bring diverse people together, are a great way to create more citizen scientists. “Although we don’t force anything, we put in their minds that there is something called citizen science and these are ways in which you can contribute. The moment they know how people are doing, it inspires them to participate,” she says. Also, they often talk about various citizen science apps like eBird, Merlin Bird ID, iNaturalist, and Season Watch on these walks.
This is another important reason why continuing these walks and growing this initiative is important to Misha and Mittal. “We want to give this some structure in a way that will empower and encourage,” says Misha, who hopes that being part of these walks will motivate women to lead their own nature walks in other parts of the country. “We do not want it to be limited to just the two of us. We want to make the community much much much bigger,” she says.
The next all-women nature walk will be held at Bengaluru’s Doddanekundi Lake on Sunday, June 9 at 6.30 am. To know more, email allwomennaturewalksindia@gmail.com or reach out to instagram.com/awnw.india
Published - June 07, 2024 09:00 am IST
