Shortly after what you see in the image I pushed Asa away. He turned round and tried to swipe my nose off. If any of you think this is one of those man hugging big cat bloody stupid things you see on youtube, well, get real. It's not. The bond is strong but so is Asa's need to be independent, the boss. This is normal. He knows I am the boss at the moment but he doesn't really like it. And neither he should. He's a leopard. At probably just over a year old he's not quite there with his hunting yet but he's doing well.
I'll blog properly soon. The project is at a crucial stage as I attempt to move Asa over the ridgeline at above 3100m to a different valley where there is a better prey base and he is further away from humans. It's working but yesterday there was a setback, you'll read about that in the bloody book, it made me as pissed off as Himalayan black bear as a lot of hard work was undone by a situation that was not the fault of Asa or me.
So we battle on. It's coming up to the 50 week mark. It feels like it. The body is hanging in there but the mind keeps thinking of family. And cheese...
So yeah, I'll update when I can. There are many people to get back to, I will when I can. Support in different ways is coming from all over the planet. The only time I can upload photos to www.mountaintiger.photography is around 1am when the signal is at its strongest, I'll give it a go tonight, there's some good ones from a couple of days ago (15 January), I need to keep selling them and I thank you for the support. UPDATE - I didn't have enough signal strength, will try again soon.
In the update there'll be news on the Health Post in Chhomrong (yes, two "h"s) which is a go ahead and WildTiger is lending support. I'll also be writing about progress in the Biosphere Reserve criteria set by UNESCO.
A lot to do but the protection of habitat for wildlife and people is a never ending thing. Cheese... er... I mean... cheers Jack.
