Winter’s here, shepherds set off to lower hills of Himachal

Ravinder Sood

Palampur, November 6

With the onset of winter in Himachal Pradesh and the possibility of early snowfall in the Dhauladhars in the Kangra valley, shepherds can be seen migrating along with their animals to warmers places in lower hills of the state.

Generation after generation, these shepherds hailing from the traditional Gaddi community of the state have been migrating during the winter. Every year, they lose hundreds of sheep and goat because of snowfall and heavy rain in higher reaches of the state.

In summers they move up in high-altitude areas of Dhauladhar hills, Chhota Bhangal, Lahaul Spiti, Kinnaur and in parts of Chamba district. In winters they roam from one place to other in Una, Bilaspur, Kangra, Hamirpur and Sirmaur districts in search of better pastures for their cattle.

The change in the snow lines in the past few years and global warming have impacted their traditional routes of seasonal migration making their lives risky and difficult as they search for new pastures. The global warming in Himachal Pradesh has also led to erratic rainfall besides shifting the snowline. Some regions have seen an increase in the intensity of rainfall, coupled with unseasonal hail storms.

Trilok Kapoor, former chairman, State Wool Federation, said because of impact of global warming and unusual rain and snow in the high-altitude areas of state many shepherds had stopped rearing sheep. Besides, the grasslands have also shrunk in the past few years because of stringent environment laws.

He said the new generation was not willing to carry on this profession anymore. There is also acute shortage of man power to hire for grazing the animals.

“The other threat is foot and mouth disease becoming common among the animals posing a major threat to the existence of the centuries-old traditional livelihood of shepherds. Livestock has become more prone to lice and ticks. The increase in temperature has also aggravated the weed problem in the hills, shrinking pastures” Kapoor added.