Why these mammals, birds and insects are among the top 10 in the favourites list

1: Leopard and Tiger (tied): The leopard for its sheer beauty, stealth, courage and cunning, as well as its ability to adapt to changing circumstances. And for the sheer guts to settle in cities such as Mumbai and Gurgaon and areas like the NCR. It has beauty, brains and brawn, a package that is hard to beat. in Africa, leopards carry kills twice their weight up trees and cock a snook at drooling hyenas circling beneath. If they ever turn man-eater, beware, they’re more dangerous than tigers as the man-eating leopard of Rudraprayag demonstrated, to Jim Corbett.

Tigers: For their overall majesty and beauty and the uncanny silence with which they move through the forest. Corbett called the tiger a ‘large-hearted gentleman’ (and then organized tiger shoots for VIPs!) and today, it has become the number one animal on the list of every visitor to a national park or sanctuary, hounded by fleets of Gypsies crammed with people desperate for photographs (and even selfies). Sadly, they are poached for their skins, teeth and claws, and the Chinese “farm” them for their bones, et al, for the imaginary medicinal qualities they are said to possess. You couldn’t insult this magnificent creature more than this! In India, alas they are fast running out of space and clash with local populations who take up the “lynch them” approach to justice.

2: Orangutans: Completely irresistible – especially as babies: huge innocent eyes, smiles and giggles, unkempt red hair and that slow, relaxed way of getting about using their limbs so languidly. They’re extremely intelligent and will observe you keenly, and then try to imitate you. Long ago, I had a very brief dalliance with an orangutan called Pinky at the Delhi Zoo, but alas, her keeper did not approve, all I got was an affectionate and strong hug, before she was hauled away. Sadly, they are in huge danger of going extinct in their native Indonesia, as plantations devastate their forests.

3: Gorillas: Huge, and usually gentle, until they feel their family is under threat, when they can scare the bejesus out of you, with that classic chest-thumping charge – more often than not a bluff. A silverback is a formidable animal and yet can be very gentle. Perhaps the world would have been a better place had we remained gorillas!

4: Rhinos: Truly astonishing two-ton armour-plated beasts with the lightness and graceful movement of a ballerina. Even fully grown, they retain their baby faces – though don’t let this fool you: some like the African black rhino are notoriously bad-tempered and will overturn your 4WD unprovoked. We, in all our profound wisdom, believe that their horns have aphrodisiac qualities, even while knowing it is comprised of nothing but matted hair made of keratin.

5: Elephants: Deemed the most dangerous animals in our forests, they are known for their smiling sagacity, renowned memories and sashaying movements. Unfortunately, bulls in ‘musth’ (not the best time to meet them) behave like government bulldozers in a similar condition. Have strong life-lasting family bonds which we would be wise to emulate, and herds are led by a matriarch, that keeps the peace, knows where to find water and food during the hard times and has delinquent males kicked out of the herd.

6: Otters: For their sheer exuberance and joi-de-vivre. Active and playful, they’re hilarious as they lie on their backs in the water, gently riding the waves and breaking the shells of crabs using stones. Also, they’re great team players and will gang up against any perceived threat (a crocodile with a gleam in its eye perhaps), seeing it off pronto. But, not to be petted!

7: Gibbons: Anyone who has heard the song of the gibbons has got to have these guys on their list. That as well as the way they swing, like trapeze-artistes hand over fist through the canopy on those, long, long, rubber-band like arms: they can hit 50 kmph while traversing the canopy. I heard them at the National Zoological Park in Delhi (alas, not in a rainforest canopy) and was enchanted forever!

8: Dogs: Always, in spite of the rather bad rap they’re getting these days. We’re the ones who are corrupting them, breeding the heck out of them for nefarious and monetary ends, bringing out the worst of their pack instincts. We can and have gentled the fiercest of breeds, too (like the mastiffs, and bulldogs), but seem keener on producing killer pit-bulls and mastiffs, which we let loose on children. Really, who has rabies here?

9: Donkeys: Who cannot but like donkeys? Eternally sorrowful, droopy-eared, without the rolling-eyed panic of horses, they’re phlegmatic and in case you didn’t know, very wise. Time and again they have saved mountaineers and trekkers from falling to their deaths by refusing to plod onward a path they know is treacherous (and for which, we call them “stubborn”).

10: The Ratel or Honey-badger: Small and pugnacious as hell, the loose-coated, silver and black honey-badger thinks nothing of taking on (and dispatching) a pride of bemused lions or a beehive full of furious bees. Totally never-say-die, feisty as they come, and with a mouth that is forever open! Not an animal to trifle with, but admired from a safe distance!