Writer, wildlife conservationist, and filmmaker Janaki Lenin is ready with her second part of the book My Husband & Other Animals. Through her book, she tries to bring attention to the conservation of smaller creatures like snakes, lizards, and frogs.

The wildlife enthusiast feels that though the wildlife conservation topic is on the radar, all the attention goes toward the magnificent animals like Tigers. And the smaller creatures are ignored. She says she attempts to correct the imbalance in the wildlife conservation through her accessible writing. She intends to do this “by giving snakes and other less charismatic animals their rightful place in the galaxy of wildlife stars.“

She spoke to The Hindu about ways to take the conservation topic beyond Tigers. She said, “Living with Rom (her husband who founded the Madras Crocodile Bank) has made me realise how reptiles don’t get their due. The media goes nuts over a tiger census, but what about species like crocodiles or critically endangered birds like the Great Indian Bustard? There is a form of speciesism that exists even in our National parks and sanctuaries and with so much being spent on conserving the tiger, we are missing a lot in between. We don’t give any other species half the attention and my problem lies with the lack of awareness about smaller creatures like frogs and centipedes.” She further questioned, “How many of us know that there are only 700 gharials left in the world or how many mugger crocodiles there are in India?“

Lenin said that the way to get people’s attention toward smaller creatures is “by encouraging research and getting the media and activists to get their heads out of their tiger obsession, for starters. We had the NDTV-Aircel Save Our Tigers campaign.“ She added, “Getting more people to write about these animals is important and it is a writer’s job to make readers care about the subject, using storytelling rather than dry reportage of facts and figures. However, there’s also another way to look at the issue. People who are interested in smaller creatures are easily outnumbered by mammal lovers, which is why awareness and communication is crucial.“

H/T: The Hindu