Ranchi, Mar 22 (PTI)The dense forests of Palamu, will once again reverberate to the roar of the king of the jungle as Jharkhand forest department is gearing up to reintroduce big cats once again into the tiger reserve.
The Palamu Tiger Reserve which was teeming with tigers in the 1970s, reported nil tigers in 2018. Though a tigress was found dead in February 2020.
Jharkhand forest department plans to replicate the success story crafted in Panna and Sariska Reserves which too reintroduced tigers in recent years.
For this, two deputy director level officers from PTR recently visited Panna Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh and Sariska Tiger Reserve in Rajasthan to study their successful tiger resettlement and conservation plans, forest officials said.
PTR field director Kumar Ashutosh told PTI, “Two deputy directors from PTR had been sent to Panna and Sariska in February to study their success stories of tiger reintroduction and improving prey base.” “The officers have submitted their preliminary study report, which mentions how these reserves improved their prey base, including increasing the number of deer and sambars, and reintroduced tigers. We are going through it to chalk out our action plan,” he said.
The forest department through the state government has also submitted a vision document to the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) in February this year where it has proposed translocation of tigers from other reserves of the country.
The director said, “If NTCA approves our proposal after its assessment, it will recommend to the Center seeking approval for tiger translocation for PTR,” he said.
Spread over 1129 sqkm, PTR, which was constituted in 1974 under Project Tiger, had 22 tigers in 1972, a former principal chief conservator of forest (wildlife), Jharkhand, Pradeep Kumar wrote in his book ‘Main Baagh Hoon’, which was published in 2016.
The reserve recorded its highest tiger population in 1995 with 71 tigers. Thereafter, population started declining. There were 44 in 1997, 34 in 2002, 10 in 2010 and 3 in 2014, according to the book.
Pointing to the reasons for declining tiger population in the reserve, former state wildlife board member DS Srivastava told PTI that dwindling prey base, frequent gunfight between police and Maoists, development works, rail and road routes and rising population of domestic cattle are the major reasons that forced tigers to leave the reserve.
Though Srivastava welcomed the idea of tiger reintroduction, he raised doubts over its success. “Until the issues that cause tigers to move out are sorted out, tigers will not stay here. The species loves tranquility and it doesn’t want disturbance in its habitat, ”he said.
Tiger census process in the PTR for the upcoming All India Tiger Estimation is still going on. PTR authority has installed around 500-high sensitive cameras to track big cats since October last year.
“We have covered around 70 per cent of the areas of the reserve with these trap cameras. However, not a single tiger has been captured on camera till date, ”said the PTR director.
He said as many as six samples of scats had been sent to Wildlife Institute of India (WII) last year. Of the six, two scats were found to be of big cats – one tiger and one leopard. The remaining four samples had been spoiled, he said.
The big cats’ re-introduction move holds significance in the backdrop of the Jharkhand High Court last year commenting on the absence of tigers in PTR:” If there is no tiger, then this agency should be closed, after all, what is the point of wasting public money? ” Of the 1,129.93 sq km area of PTR, 414.08 sq km is marked as core area (critical tiger habitat) and the remaining 715.85 sq km as the buffer zone. Of the total area, 226.32 sq km is designated as Betla National Park. In the buffer zone, 53 sq km is open for tourists.
PTR mainly consists of sal and deciduous forests and bamboo groves. The reserve zone is a watershed area for Koel, Burha and Auranga rivers.
It was one of the first nine tiger reserves of the country during the inception of Project Tiger. The first tiger census, based on pugmark count, was carried out in PTR in 1932 under the supervision of then Palamu Divisional Forest Officer JW Nicholson.
Apart from leopards, it also boasts of elephants, gray wolf, gaur, sloth bear, four-horned antelope, Indian ratel, otter and pangolin among its inhabitants.
A total of 47 species of mammals and 174 species of birds, 970 species of plants, 17 species of grass and 56 species of medicinal plants have been identified in PTR, officials said. PTI SAN NAM JRC JRC
This report is auto-generated from PTI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.