Two Tigresses Released in Sundarbans

CANNING (WB), Jul 4 (PTI) Two tigresses caged by wildlife personnel were released in the core area of Sundarbans Tiger Reserve in West Bengal after fixing steel plates to their ears and implanting microchips on their tails.

Field director of Sundarbans Tiger Reserve, Subrat Mukhodhayay said the microchips had been brought from the US and implanted to the tigresses tails to keep a watch on their movement.

The microchips were implanted by wildlife experts from Delhi and Dehradun, he said.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit Sundarbans National Park on our many wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites www.naturetrailsindia.info and www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

Madhya Pradesh (Land Of Tigers) Sets Up Special Force To Protect Tigers

BHOPAL: With its tiger population dwindling sharply over the last two years, a worried Madhya Pradesh government will deploy a Special Tiger
Protection Force in its three tiger reserves of Kanha, Bandhavgarh and Pench to arrest the big cat’s rapid decline.

The state government took the decision as it does not want to lose its ‘Tiger State’ tag to Karnataka due to the falling number of the big cats, according to a forest department official. The number of tigers in the state is reported to have dropped from 300 in 2007 to 232 in 2009, he said.

A tiger census conducted by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) in 2007 put the number of big cats in Madhya Pradesh at 300, followed by Karnataka with 290. However, another census conducted by the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) in 2008 has put the population in five tiger reserves in Madhya Pradesh at 232 – with 89 big cats in Kanha, 47 in Bandhavgarh, 39 in Satpura, 33 in Pench and 24 in Panna.

However, in April this year a four-member central inquiry committee announced that Panna had no tigers since January. “It is regrettable that not even one tiger is left in Panna,” committee chairman and former NTCA director P.K. Sen had said after visiting the tiger reserve in eastern Madhya Pradesh.

Concerned over the report, the Madhya Pradesh government formed a six-member committee to look into the matter. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also transferred the field directors of Panna, Kanha and Bandhavgarh national parks late last month. “Now a Special Tiger Protection Force is on the anvil to protect the big cats in the various tiger reserves of the state,” a senior wild life official said, not wishing to be identified as he is not authorized to speak to the media.

The state Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, H.S. Pabla, admitted that the tiger population in Panna had decreased but said the figure has remained constant in other reserves of the state.

Minister of State for Forests Rajendra Shukla last week instructed departmental officers to expedite the constitution of the Special Tiger Protection Force. Every company of the force would comprise 112 jawans, three sub-inspectors and six head constables and be headed by a deputy superintendent of police.

Constables of the force will be on deputation from the local police department and be below 40 years of age. Their deputation will continue till the police department creates permanent posts for the force.

The force will work under the control and guidance of the tiger reserve’s Field Director, who will send a monthly report about it to the National Tiger Protection Authority. The cops will be exclusively for tiger protection and be empowered to use firearms in dealing with poachers and organized criminals within the periphery of the reserves.

Officers of the state police department and central forces will impart training to the constables on skill development, dealing with poaching and acting on information.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit Central India (Land of Tigers) Wildlife National Park on our many wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites www.naturetrailsindia.info and www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

News Courtesy:- Economy Times

CEC opposes NHAI Road Project in Pench Tiger Reserve

NEW DELHI: In a boost to wildlife lobby, Supreme Court-appointed Centrally Empowered Committee (CEC) has shot down a controversial proposal of the National Highways Authority of India’s (NHAI) to widen a road passing through Pench Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh, contending that it will be a threat to animals and the fragile ecosystem.

In the report submitted to the apex court last week, the CEC members said that the widening of the road connecting Nagpur to Jabalpur from two lanes to four lanes will increase traffic frequency in the area, scaring the animals, including endangered species like tigers and gaurs in the region, which may fall victim to the speeding vehicles.

The CEC also rejected the NHAI’s alternative Rs 600- crore plan to build 13 bridges and underpass on the route so that wildlife movement is not hampered, a source said.

The highway project which is a part of the North-South corridor covers a distance of 8.7 kilometer and passes through the tiger reserve and the reserve forest contiguous.

It was referred to the panel after the Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) moved a petition for stopping the project alleging that road widening would fragment wildlife habitat and restrict movement of already dwindling wildlife between Pench and Kanha Tiger Reserve.

The members have, however, have not sought closing down of the road but suggested that only light vehicles at a specified speed should be permitted while a complete ban be imposed on night traffic to prevent animal casualty.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit Pench National Park on our many Central India wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites www.naturetrailsindia.info and www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

News Courtesy Economic Times

Tigress shifted to Bhadra Tiger Reserve

MYSORE: The six-year-old tigress that was captured in Nagarahole
National Park will now have to get used to a new home. For it will be
relocated to the tiger reserve of Bhadra Wildlife Sanctuary in
Chikmagalur district.

The decision follows consultation with the experts in wildlife, who
suggested the forest officials to relocate it to some other area far
from its present location. This is to cut down chances of the tiger
coming back to the area and attacking cattle.

A team led by RFO Satish took the tigress, which was nursed at
Sunkadakatte in Nagarhole National Park, to Chikmagalur early Monday. The senior officials of the department contacted the Project Tiger officials and took their consent for its relocation.

Though the Bandipur National Park in Chamarajanagar district was
considered as a possible option it was dropped as it is close to
Nagarhole National Park, its present territory. "The experts told us
there are chances that it will come back again to its territory if it
is let out into close by forested areas. So it was decided to change
its territory, sources told `The Times of India'. However, it does not
face threat from tigers at Bhadra wildlife sanctuary since it is a
tigress and will not overlap the territory, they contended.

The prey-predator base at Bhadra is balanced and so the big cat will
not have problems. If it was a tiger it could have been a problem for
relocation. But there is no such chance here, they added. But a
wildlife activist said it could face problems in its new area which
could again push it back to take easy route to get its feed. There is
a possibility that it could start visiting the villages on the forest
fringes in Western Ghats. But the saving grace is that people in the
Western Ghats are used to threats from wild animals, he stated. Field director (project tiger) B J Hosmath was not available for comments.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit Bhadra National Park on many South India wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites http://www.naturetrailsindia.info and http://www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

Centre Clears Trans Location of 4 Tigers to Panna

New Delhi : After losing all its tigers to poaching, Panna Tiger Reserve is set to get a second chance. The Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) has cleared a proposal to trans locate two tigers and two tigresses to the reserve. But in a letter to Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the MoEF has made it clear that it expects action to be taken after the “Panna disaster”.

The letter, sent by MoEF Minister Jairam Ramesh, calls for “urgent administrative and ecological actions”, saying “responsibility should be fixed on erring officials as pointed out in the SIT report and disciplinary action be taken”. Seeking personal intervention of the CM in Panna, the letter has asked for a follow-up action report and directed that a site-specific security plan be drawn up for Panna. As already reported by The Indian Express, a probe by the SIT, set up by the Centre, found that senior officials ignored all warnings regarding Panna, resulting in the loss of more than 40 tigers to poaching.

“I solicit your personal intervention for early action indicated, to avoid Panna-type disasters,” said the letter, and asked for the phasing out of tourism activities from the core areas of Panna and moving it to buffer areas. “The guidelines and red alerts sent by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) were ignored (in Panna),” the letter points out, citing the SIT observations.

The states ignoring NTCA’s warnings is a common occurrence since wildlife is a concurrent subject. This is now set to end as the Cabinet has okayed bringing the position of NTCA member secretary at par with the Chief Wildlife Warden at the state-level.

“This will strengthen the NTCA’s position,” Ramesh told The Indian Express.

In the past, states have often ignored NTCA advisories on issues like transfer of officials, culling of maneaters and notifying buffer zones for tiger reserves. This had reduced the NTCA to little more than a fund-giving body for the Centrally sponsored Project Tiger scheme.

Madhya Pradesh has been at loggerheads with the NTCA on the Panna issue, declaring that it had enough tigers in the reserve as late as March 2009. However, a Wildlife Institute of India camera trap survey in February showed that tigers had completely vanished from Panna.

The genetic stock of Panna was lost after all its tigers were poached between 2002 and 2009. Currently, the reserve only has two tigresses, translocated to Panna from Kanha and Bandhavgarh after it was learnt that there were no big cats left in the reserve.

The four tigers will now be moved as per a new tiger trans location protocol. The new protocol is a response to a spate of local tiger extinctions in the country, starting with Sariska in Rajasthan in 2005, and now Panna, which necessitates moving tigers from other parts of the country to these reserves.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit Panna National Park on many Central India wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites http://www.naturetrailsindia.info and http://www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

Sariska Tigers Mate First Litter by Monsoon End

More than four years after the Sariska Tiger Reserve earned worldwide notoriety for having lost its entire tiger population, hopes are high that the reserve will finally have its "own" tigers again.

The three relocated tigers - two females and a male, all of them from Ranthambore - have taken to their new habitat very well and have been mating. Two were recently "caught in the act" by a Wildlife Institute of India researcher and the second tigress - which has been mating with the male since November - according to WII officials, is in the family way.

Tigers have a gestation period of about 100 days and WII experts expect the first litter to arrive before the end of the monsoon.

According to WII (Wildlife Institute of India) research coordinator K Shankar, the two tigresses are aware of each others presence but have not met so far probably because ``they are keen to avoid confrontation.'' While one of them has settled in Bagani - the site of a village which was relocated out of Sariska last year as part of the initiative to make the forest safer for tigers - the other, pregnant female has marked the Sariska-Kalighatti valley as its "territory." It was the Bagani female which was photographed with the tiger. The first tiger was brought to Sariska on June 28, 2008, the second on July 5 and the third on February 25 this year.

Shankar said mating does not necessarily result in pregnancy because tigers have induced ovulation. "The female releases the egg only when she is comfortable enough in her surroundings and feels that she is ready to raise a litter. The Kalighatti female seems to have done so," he said.

Happy as they are at the prospect of the striped beauties returning to Sariska, Shankar said there was hardly any doubt that the tigers would breed. As members of the cat family, tigers are prolific maters. The real challenge, he added, is to save the coming generation from meeting the same fate as their predecessors in the forest.

"Tigers did not die out from Sariska. They were poached. There is an elaborate plan in place now to protect them. There are 100 homeguards and another 100 ex-servicemen who have been recruited. All the older guards have been shifted out of forest duty so that there is an entire staff of young people patrolling the forest. Poaching routes have been identified and the intelligence network has been strengthened," Shankar said.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit Sariska National Park on many Rajasthan wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites http://www.naturetrailsindia.info and http://www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Sariska-tigers-mate-litter-by-monsoon/articleshow/4629186.cms

Goa has its first Tigress with Cub

Panaji (IANS): Even as the Royal Bengal tiger appears to have virtually disappeared from renowned reserve forests like Sariska and Ranthambore in Rajasthan, pug marks of a tigress and a cub have been spotted for the first time in Goa's Mhadei wildlife sanctuary.

Officials of the Forest Department, which is grappling with a tiger-poaching probe, spotted the fresh pug marks May 12 in the decade-old sanctuary, about 60 km from here. The marks were only a short distance from the area where a tiger was allegedly killed by poachers last month.

Chief Conservator of Forests (CCF) Shashi Kumar told IANS that the sighting proved that the wildlife sanctuary had proved to be an ideal habitat for tigers.

The sighting occurred near the Anjunem dam. From the footprints, it appears that a tigress was walking her cub along the edge of the reservoir. It is an amazing development. It is a great sign considering the fact that tigers have disappeared from some of the top reserve forests in the country said Mr. Kumar.

They may have visited the sanctuary from the adjoining forests in Maharashtra or Karnataka, which has contiguous forest cover. We have never had direct evidence about the existence of a tiger in our forests," he added.

Commenting on the status of the investigation into tiger poaching, Mr. Kumar said that forest officials were having a tough time collecting hard evidence despite the fact that local residents acknowledged the incident.

The statements given by the people arrested change every now and then. We have arrested a couple of people who are experts at making and laying out traps and those who have been arrested for poaching in the past. But not much evidence has been forthcoming," said Mr. Kumar.

The killing of a tiger, which is protected under Schedule 1 of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972, is a grave offense.

Mr. Kumar said the department had been unable to seize the mobile phone, which was used to photograph the dead beast. The poaching incident came to light after the photograph was published in a national daily newspaper last month by wildlife activist Rajendra Kerkar.

We have attached a computer hard disc on which we suspect the photograph of the dead tiger was stored. We will be sending it to technical experts so that it can be scanned for any incriminating evidence," said Kumar said.

The Mhadei wildlife sanctuary is located in Goa's northernmost Sattari taluk and is spread across 208 sq. m. It was notified in 1999.

Nature Trails India, a brand of Nature Trail Tours India Pvt. Ltd, visit GOA on many wildlife tours to India. for details please visit our websites http://www.naturetrailsindia.info and http://www.birdwatchingtoursindia.com or email us at enquiries@naturetrailsindia.info or on ntrails@gmail.com

New Courtesy www.hindu.com