Wading silently through deep forest streams, without a rustle below the feet, our team of four scans expectantly across the wilderness. A day ago, there was news of a sighting, a rare white flash; we are seeking – the White Winged Duck locally known as Deohaanh or the divine duck.

As Samuel leads the trek, he whispers stories of a bird that is revered as the spirit of the forest. Even today, some tribes believe the Deohaanh to be the bearer of rains. The White Winged Duck is slowly losing out to habitat destruction. A bird that was numbered in hundreds a decade ago, is now feared reduced to a few dozens today. A threatened species today, the duck is just reported from a few remote and wild pockets of Arunachal Pradesh and one such could be the patch the team is surveying today.

Samuel was always fascinated by these streams. His love for wilderness is so intense that he taught himself the names of more than 100 birds and butterflies found in these forests. He has been encountering the Deohaanh since early childhood and was the perfect guide to help us on our search today.

Along the way, he also explains the real reasons behind the problem. The local tribes, one of which Samuel belongs to, have been dependent on these forests for ages. The forest has been a provider – from fishes to medicinal herbs. However, the locals have always cared enough to not break the little barrier between using and exploiting. With increasing human interference for commercial motives, these values are now getting cornered and consequently, harming the integrity of the wilderness.

The elusive White Winged Duck is highly sensitive to human interference. It is also one of those indicator species that the scientific community in interested in. The goal is not just the survival of the Deohaanh but the whole ecological diversity of its habitat. Being so unique, the Deohaanh has been declared as the state bird of Assam. Even so, its numbers are believed to be less than 500 in the wild.

Thus, started a year-long exercise, jointly agreed upon by the Arunachal Pradesh Forest Department and Wildlife Trust of India. Involving birdwatchers and conservation professionals from across India, field teams will tryto put together a basic range of the White Winged Duck in the state. While its presence is well recorded in the eastern regions of Assam, there is very little credible data from Arunachal Pradesh. Data from this survey would enable us understand this highly elusive bird and develop plans to secure its habitat.

I had been here for five days and the day’s trek had started by crossing the Pakke River and making our way upstream along the nallah. We already had loaded up on an incredible bowl of pork thukpa. Further, a few packets of biscuits and locally baked cakes were stocked up. It was going to be a long day and we were ready for it. Crossing the river wasn’t easy and we had to hold hands and make a human chain to get a sure footing on the slippery rocks of the river bed. The adventure had just begun!

With the monsoons nearing and a few showers days before, our chances of seeing the duck were getting slim with each passing day. The duck prefers undisturbed and stagnant water pools below forest canopies. It will lay its eggs on trees overhanging these pools such that the first jump of its chicks will get them to the water. It’s an untouched and unpolluted life that the Deohaanh leads. With rainwater slowly taking force along the mountain slopes, the bird will fly to even higher and secluded pools. But again, we were a very hopeful bunch and had all our senses at high alert. It didn’t matter how many leeches we shared blood with or how many tick bites that got ignored; our focus was on seeing that one white flash. Having Samuel with us was another advantage as he constantly kept us intrigued by the stories of the tribes and their links to the wilderness.

We would have walked 10 odd kilometers when we took our first break around 1 in the afternoon, slowly making our way through the perfectly round but fast shifting rocks. It was necessary that we made the minimum amount of noise on our walk and this also meant that our pace was slow and highly calculated. Our prize could be resting in some odd turn of the stream and we couldn’t miss it. With the sun high on the sky and our boots wet since morning, this was as far as we could go upstream. After this the stream goes underground, showing itself in just a few places but mostly shy. Samuel suggested that we take a different route back. It would be a narrower stream but an equally promising one. We finished our biscuits and the second leg of the trek convened. This time, the path had the addition of overhanging foliage and this only meant more ticks and leeches springing at us!

They say when you have clarity of intention, the universe conspires to make it happen. It certainly wasn’tjust sheer luck but our hard work and dedication did pay off before the end of the day. And when the white flash did appear, we were too stunned to do anything else but admire. Not one camera clicked but the moment froze in time. The Deohaanh was indeed a spirit, a fluttering one that shows up to a chosen few. We were the chosen ones that day and there was renewed strength in our soaked feet.

My colleague Aftab the field biologisthad immediately gained a sparkle in his eyes and putting “the” waypoint into his GPS device seemed like discovering a lost treasure map. For Samuel, it was another win. He finally had been able to prove that he is the chosen one who gets to see the Deohaanh every time he wades through his jungle. For me, it was justa happy stupor. Each one of us gloated in our own victory! It was already 5 PM and darkness was setting in these forests of the north east. It was time to return.

We repeated the trek for the next 10 days and this one other time, our volunteer Adil Hussain was able to press the shutter. It was on our 13^th day of trek that the Deohaanh showed up mysteriously again. If you have ever had a déjà vu, this was something similar. A moment was repeated and this put back the energy in our efforts. We trekked everyday, for 15 days, setting up camera traps and recording GPS of potential locations. Waking up every morning along with the sun, wading rivers, trekking deep jungles and surviving uncountable bug bites, we shared the spirit of the forest – the spirit for survival, the courage to be happy and the hope for a better future.

WTI will continue this exercise through the year and across the hill state of Arunachal Pradesh. I wish I could come back for more, walk a few more streams, get a few more leech bites, watch fireflies around my tent and share food and drink around the tent with Aftab while revisiting the day’s exploits.

I hope that the Deohaanh gets back its water pools and the jungle, its divine spirit. We hope for a future when numerous white flashes will populate our jungles as their secure everlasting home.

Click here to learn how you can help conserve this elusive species.

Madhumay Mallik is passionate about photography, travel and documenting his exploits, not necessarily in that order. He is an enthusiastic member of our Communications team, raring to travel and document stories from our field projects.

White winged Wood duck pic by Aftab Ahmed
Survey pics by Madhumay Mallik