Q1.
In what ways do people in Sunderbans depend on the mangrove forests?
Answer
The forest is their food, their work and their wall against the sea. Families here have lived beside it for generations and take from it what they need for each day.
| What people get | How they get it |
|---|---|
| Fish and prawns | They fish in the creeks with nets, and catch prawn seed in the shallows. Fish is their main food and their main earning. |
| Crabs | Mud crabs are collected from among the roots and sold in the market. |
| Honey and wax | Honey collectors go into the forest in the season and cut wild bees' combs from the trees. This is the most dangerous work of all, because of tigers. |
| Firewood and building wood | Dry branches for the cooking fire, poles for house frames and for boats. |
| Leaves and thatch | Palm and grass from the forest edge for roofs and mats. |
| Safety from storms | The thick belt of trees breaks the force of cyclone winds and waves before they reach the villages behind. |
| Land that stays put | Mangrove roots hold the mud together, so the river does not wash the islands away. |
| Nursery for the catch | Fish and prawns breed among the roots. No mangroves would soon mean no fish to catch. |
| Visitors | Some people work as boatmen and guides for those who come to see the forest. |
Why this is called living in harmony: They take honey but leave the hive to rebuild. They fish but leave the breeding creeks alone in the season. They cut branches, not whole trees. They know that if the forest goes, so does everything they live on — so protecting it and using it are the same job.
The mask on the back of the head: A tiger springs at a person's back. Honey collectors and woodcutters sometimes wear a face mask backwards, so that whichever way the tiger looks, a face seems to be looking back. It may make a tiger hold off. It is not perfect, but it shows how carefully these people have studied the animal they share the forest with.