Chhatru Devi (HINDI):
The jujurana is found near my house. It’s the most beautiful creature.


Sanjeeva Pandey:
“Juju” is bird, and “rana” is king. So to locals, this is “king of birds.”
The local people love it so much that they want to have their own local taxonomy.


Chhatru Devi (HINDI):
He is the king of the jungle. Its plumage looks so wonderful!


Narasimha:
It has a black head, an orangish face, an orangish throat, and it has a prominent black on its body with white spots. It’s a high-altitude pheasant. Western tragopans live in a very complex habitat, because of which it’s very difficult to study and observe in detail their ecology in the wild.


Alam Singh:
Nobody has ever seen a western tragopan’s nest in the wild. I consider the western tragopan special because it’s found only in western Asia. And it is very elusive.


Munmun Dhalaria:
The western tragopan is the flagship species of my home state, Himachal Pradesh. It’s only found in the smallest slivers of the western Himalaya, and nowhere else on the planet.

The Great Himalayan National Park is one of the last pristine landscapes left in India, and many hidden creatures live here, sharing their home with the king of birds. I wanted to film this mythical creature, and what I got to experience was the passion of a few people who are trying their best to protect it. The guards patrol these forests, even in the dead of winter, living far away from their families and mobile network. They brave the cold, the bears, and poachers,
without any safety net.

Filming the more common pheasants also felt rewarding in this landscape. For months, getting close to these birds seemed impossible. But somehow I had a feeling we would find them. A few months into our research, on a cold April morning, I saw him for the first time. It was only a fleeting glimpse.



Chhatru Devi (HINDI):
It hurts me here. I don’t understand why people kill it. Now people are hunting them, and there aren’t many left. They are hunted at night.


Narasimha:
Human disturbances is a major reason why the habitat of the bird is shrinking. We are losing a lot of biodiversity across the globe. Reversing this process should start somewhere.


Sanjeeva Pandey:
The most important value is roadlessness in the park. Great Himalayan National Park Conservation Area, GHNPCA, will be about 3,000 square kilometers, which is remarkable, because nowhere in western Himalayas do we see such a compact area devoid of habitation. So this is an ace in conservation.


Munmun Dhalaria:
There is another group of people who are losing their sleep for this bird. They are the ones who breed them in captivity. This bird is facing local extinction and having a reserve population is critical to its survival.


Alam Singh:
This is the only conservation breeding center in the entire world where the western tragopan is housed and bred. The western tragopan is a highly dimorphic bird. Basically, by looking at the bird, you can make out which is the male and which is the female. We have raised these by hand.


Roshanlal Dogra:
My name is Roshanlal Dogra. I have been working in this pheasantry for 20 years. I didn’t know anything about the bird. Now I can observe a lot of behavior. I see them taking dust baths, stretching their legs, and I see what they eat.


Narasimha:
There’s a very unique thing about them. These are elevated nesters. They were always given ground nests, and the moment I knew they were elevated nesters, that was the trick to be done. Since the past 7 years, we have actually managed to breed 37 chicks by natural means, which, in itself, is a great achievement.



Munmun Dhalaria:
It’s not easy to breed a shy, territorial bird. Watching the western tragopan’s display is a treat for the eyes. Throughout the mating season, he relentlessly pursues his potential lover, showing off his puffed body many times during the day, he nudges her, ever so slightly. He has an elaborate and graceful dance routine that ends in a somewhat awkward chase. The vibrant wattle with the streaks of blue and red is striking, but the female isn’t always impressed.

I couldn’t believe he let us see him for so long. He truly was “the king of the jungle.”


Narasimha:
What are the wild habits of the tragopan? Why does the tragopan species occur in a particular habitat, and what are the factors which actually govern this, is something which really needs to be studied.

Well, if you look at bird conservation in India—we lack fundamental understanding about many bird species and their status and distribution. Pheasants are one such group of birds which are very poorly studied. With its very rare and elusive nature, tragopan makes it to the top of the list.


Munmun Dhalaria:
In these forests, biologists are making new discoveries to this day, and people need to see these animals in their habitat before they’re gone.


Sanjeeva Pandey:
You have to love your park. In case you love your park, you will do anything for it.


Munmun Dhalaria:
My search was finally over, but the story of this bird has only just begun.