Lucy Cheeley

Here at the NTNC BCC, we live in a little hut complex on stilts to accommodate for flooding during the monsoon season. The huts are made of wooden planks and are interconnected by a wrap around porch. I have seen lots of things from our porch that overlooks the jungle: Red Jungle Fowl, Black Hooded Oriole, Oriental Pied Hornbills, Orange Breasted Green Pigeon, Indian Peafowl, spotted deer, the retired NTNC elephant strolling past, or the resident baby rhino, Puja, running around with her caretaker Lalu.

Last night I was dozing off in bed after a dinner out with friends when I heard a gentle tapping on my window. After waking up a bit, I realized it was Lalu. He whispered, “Are you awake? There’s a Leopard!” I grabbed my headlamp and ran out the door without shoes after him. Since being in Nepal, we have only had misfortune when it came to seeing big cats. We missed out on seeing a tiger on the safari and were told that leopards rarely come to this area of Nepal. The only cats I’ve seen were the domestic ones hanging around camp. We ran to the elephant boarding ladder and climbed to the top to see a leopard laying on the same path I walk on during my bird surveys. Laura and later Nigel joined us soon after to see the leopard. The leopard yawned and rolled over, showcasing the beautiful spots on his coat. All the BCC residents gathered to see the leopard, and all of us huddled around to try and get a good look.

We ran back to our hut to grab binoculars and our phones to try and capture any sort of photo. It was around 9:00pm so we were already in our pajamas, and it was pitch black outside besides our head lamps. Taking photos through binoculars is already difficult enough, but with the added darkness, all we were getting was blurry photos of a blob on the path. The leopard wasn’t going to stick around for much longer, so we had to hurry if we wanted a photo. Our first leopard sighting was over as the leopard stretched, stood up, and disappeared into the dark jungle. All of us stood there in awe. We couldn’t believe the luck we had to see the focus of our study in Nepal. We all returned excitedly to the hut, fully awake from the adrenaline. Then we thought, “Wait, there’s a leopard living outside our hut… better be careful!” Long story short, we didn’t shower or use the restrooms until morning.

Shashank, our resident leopard expert, unfortunately had left for Kathmandu earlier that day, so could only experience the sighting through photos. He said that “Harka [a local] was telling me this morning that he hasn’t seen a resident leopard in this area for quite some time.” It was such an amazing experience to see a leopard in its natural habitat, and a memory all of us will hold on to dearly for years to come.