If a tourist is in Palamu Tiger Reserve and finds a peacock there perchance the tourist need not worry at all about any poisonous or non poisonous snake there. Peacock is sworn enemy of the snakes .
An 4 page booklet issued by Neo Human Foundation Hazaribag on peacock which is a national bird reads that peacock eats snake very fondly. Peacock thus helps in retaining the population of snakes.
Snakes in the PTR have their own history. About four weeks back a huge python grabbed a monkey and swallowed it said the Betla ranger Nathuni Singh.
Singh said this incident brought the entire fleet of monkeys near the python who wanted to kill it by biting. The monkeys angst was swallowing of the monkey by the python. The ranger said the python was then left in the water body at Nawa Bandh to save it from the attacking monkeys.
Palamu tiger reserve has non poisonous snakes too like Hurhurwa ( striped keel back) dhounra ( water snake) chitbarwa karait ( wolf snake) and patsugwa ( green keelback). Sources said tourists in PTR are advised not to get down from their four wheel as no one knowswhat lies beneath the grass. It is a sheer luck that no tourist has ever been bitten by any snake here as then it will have a whole lot of problems since there is no health centre here where anti snake venom is any available except 26 Kms off it in Daltonganj town.
DFO Core A K Mishra and D S Srivastava a noted environmentalist contend that this PTR should have a breeding centre cum rehabilitation centre for the national bird peacock. DFO Core said there is this centre for peacock in Haryana.
D S Srivastava said all efforts be made to conserve peacock otherwise it will have the same fate like that of the bison which has gone off from sanctuaries in state having some three to four dozen population of it only in PTR here.