Free-ranging dogs, changing livelihoods reshape an agro

- Rapid socio-economic changes in Spiti are transforming the region’s traditional agro-pastoral system, impacting livestock rearing and farming. - Livestock, particularly sheep and goats, have declined over the past two decades, with free-ranging domestic dogs emerging as a major driver of losses. - Study says managing free-ranging dogs through integrated, community-led approaches is critical to protecting livelihoods, reducing impacts on wildlife, and sustaining the resilience of Spiti’s socio-ecological landscape. Free-ranging dogs are a growing threat to livestock in Himachal Pradesh’s Upper Spiti, with many herders now considering them a greater risk than traditional predators such as snow leopards and wolves, a new study finds. Communities in this region have long depended on a closely linked agro-pastoral system, where sheep, goats, cattle, yaks, and horses support livelihoods, while their manure nourishes farming in the cold desert landscape. However, over the past few decades, rapid socio-economic changes including tourism, market integration, government development schemes, and changing agricultural practices have transformed this traditional system, and subsequently, the landscape itself. More recently, the unexpected and growing rise of free-ranging domestic dogs is increasingly disrupting this delicate balance. The study examines how these interconnected changes have altered livestock populations, exploring what these shifts mean for agriculture, livelihoods, and the future of Spiti. It builds on an existing body of work that has documented socio-economic transitions in the region, notably, the role of changing human activities and the emerging influence exerted by dogs. Declining livestock numbers As part of the study, researchers conducted semi-structured interviews across 27 villages in eight panchayats in Upper Spiti in 2014-15, examining changes in livestock ownership, manure use, herding challenges, livestock losses, and future preferences. Around 72% of respondents reported a decline in livestock between 2003 and 2013, while only 10% reported an increase. Several villages had stopped rearing sheep and goats altogether, and in others, the number of households keeping them had fallen by 50-75%. The reasons the participants cited for livestock decline included herding challenges (38% of all responses), shortage of fodder (28%) and wild carnivores such as wolves and snow leopards preying on the livestock (25%). Other reasons for decline (<15%) included mechanised agriculture, disease, changing family structures, and greater income from cash crops. However, attacks by domestic dogs emerged as the most frequently-cited reasons for livestock decline, reported by 66% of respondents. Nearly 59% reported livestock depredation by dogs in the five years prior to the survey, and many (48%) considered dogs a greater threat than wild carnivores. “The increasing number of dogs started impacting agro-pastoralist communities as, along with snow leopards and wolves, they started predating on livestock, and over time, emerged as a significant livestock predator,” says Chandrima Home, corresponding author of the study and an assistant professor at Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE). Home conducted this research when she was a doctoral student at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment and MAHE. A changing economy Mountain communities are often highly adaptable, but they are also among the most sensitive to environmental and economic changes. Spiti is no different, and has witnessed significant shifts over the past few decades. “Traditional agro-pastoral systems in Spiti evolved over centuries in close balance with the region’s harsh environment,” says Priyanka Justa, Community Conservation Manager & Research Ecologist, Spiti Snow Leopard Program at S.P.E.C.I.E.S. (The Society for the Preservation of Endangered Carnivores and their International Ecological Study). “Tourism and development have brought important economic opportunities, but they have also transformed how people use the landscape.” Enabled by policy changes, tourism opened up in 1992 and boomed after 2016, cash crops like apples and green peas were introduced, and government schemes increased access to employment opportunities and land for agriculture; all adding to the complex changes taking place within the landscape. “I did not expect these interconnections with policy, disentangling their specific impacts,” Home adds. “These were not straightforward and linear. The policies brought into the landscape had an impact on livestock numbers and composition across different timescales.” Tourism has generated employment but has also increased waste accumulation in the absence of adequate disposal and management systems. Garbage dumps now provide a reliable food source for dogs, allowing their populations to grow and sustain within human settlements. And as dogs become increasingly free-ranging, livestock attacks have become more common, creating a new form of conflict alongside long-standing losses to wild carnivores. While recent data on changes in the free-ranging dog population in Spiti are limited, available estimates indicate that their numbers are substantial. A 2013 survey, also led by Home, estimated a minimum of around 570 adult dogs in Upper Spiti, while her subsequent study estimated the total population, including juveniles and pups, at around 1,500. Another estimate from 2019 puts the free-ranging dog population at close to 1,000 across Spiti. However, these estimates do not conclusively establish a population increase over time as formal data on free-ranging dog populations in Spiti and elsewhere in India remain limited. Impacts beyond livelihoods The decline in livestock is reshaping labour systems and agricultural practices in Spiti. While development has diversified income sources, it has also changed traditional systems that sought balance. As fewer households keep small-bodied livestock, herding duties rotate more frequently, increasing the burden on those that do, fuelling the need for more labour. This, and economic losses due to livestock depredation have increased dependence on hired herders, including migrant workers from other Indian states and Nepal. A previous study notes that migrant herders, due to a lack of understanding of the traditional rotational system, often grazed livestock only in nearby pastures, causing localised degradation. “Introduction of lucrative cash crops in Spiti and elsewhere have provided more stable livelihood alternatives,” says Neeraj Mahar, a Project Scientist at the Wildlife Institute of India (WII). “Pastoralism demands hardship and the young generation is more inclined towards education and stable job options.” Another study by Home also notes emerging reports of dogs attacking yak calves, raising concerns that predation could increasingly affect larger livestock if sheep and goat numbers continue to decline. In the last two decades, there was a reduction in the population of small-bodied livestock (71% decline in sheep, 68% decline in goat population). Sheep and goats are an important shared food resource for several carnivores in the landscape. “If their numbers continue to decline, competition for food is likely to intensify, potentially increasing pressure on both wild prey and other livestock,” Justa says. “Native predators such as snow leopards and Himalayan wolves are likely to face greater competition for food, increasing the energetic and behavioural costs of coexistence.” Additionally, livestock manure is a vital agricultural input in Spiti’s farming system. Green pea cultivation and other crops depend heavily on organic manure, traditionally (mainly) supplied by small-bodied livestock and composted household waste. With declining livestock, around 44% of respondents reported obtaining manure from outside the landscape, or through long-standing agreements with migratory Gaddi pastoralists, who graze sheep and goats in Spiti during summer. At the landscape level, expanding dog populations also increase opportunities for disease transmission to wild carnivores. Home says that dogs have emerged as an “unlikely keystone player” in the landscape, adding that they are “unlikely” as one would have never thought that a domestic carnivore would start killing livestock in this landscape. “When I say ‘keystone player’, I also indicate how these species became an emergent threat in recent years.” Need for coordinated action The authors emphasise that addressing these challenges requires coordinated action rather than isolated interventions. Home stresses that management requires a bottom-up approach rather than a top-down one, adding that “it also needs policies that speak to each other”. Justa says that free-ranging dogs, tourism, waste management, livestock, public health and wildlife conservation are all interconnected. “This means that solutions also need to be integrated, community-led and sustainable. We need approaches that combine ecological research with veterinary interventions, responsible tourism, improved waste management, community participation and local governance.” Justa adds that conservation challenges like this cannot be addressed in isolation According to Mahar an animal birth control (ABC) programme is not going to solve the issue. “But it can be managed through a combination of systematic capture-neuter method/ABC, responsible ownership, community participation, and adoption drives.” The authors outline two possible futures for Spiti’s agro-pastoral system. In one scenario, rising incomes allow households to hire herders, helping sustain or even increase small-bodied livestock such as sheep and goats. In the other, higher incomes reduce dependence on these animals, with households relying on imported manure, while shifting towards larger livestock like yaks and cattle, which are easier to manage and more profitable. Both may coexist across different parts of the landscape. Regardless of which path unfolds, the study warns that understanding the shifting relationships between markets, tourism, labour, agricultural transitions, and human-supported dog populations will be critical. Without addressing these linkages, efforts to sustain both livelihoods and the socio-ecological system of Spiti may be challenging. Banner image: Poor waste management, among other things, in Spiti allows for free-ranging dog populations to rise as they have easy access to food. This results in far-reaching consequences for the ecology of the region. Image by Abi Tamim Vanak.