After an almost 36-hour journey protecting over 1,000 km, a tigress from the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve in Maharashtra on Sunday reached its new dwelling – the Similipal Tiger Reserve (STR) in Odisha.
The translocation undertaking is a part of Odisha authorities’s efforts to enhance the gene pool of tigers contained in the reserve, which is unfold throughout 2,750 sq. km in Mayurbhanj district and is the nation’s solely wild habitat for melanistic royal Bengal tigers.
Genetic analyses of different tiger populations in India and pc simulations counsel that the black tigers of Similipal might have come from a really small founding inhabitants and are inbred.
The Odisha Tiger Estimation carried out this yr discovered that out of the overall 24 grownup tigers in Similipal, 13 are pseudo-melanistic. Additionally, 10 of the 24 are males and 14 are females.
In March, the state authorities had sought the approval of the Nationwide Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) to introduce Similipal’s black tigers to feminine tigers from places in central India that match the panorama and local weather of Similipal. NTCA officers then visited Similipal, after which the physique gave its nod to the translocation undertaking, sources stated.
Therefore, the state authorities determined to introduce tigers from geographically proximate, however high-heterozygosity (extra genetic variety) inhabitants areas.
“The two.5-year-old tigress was captured at round 9 am on Saturday and introduced in a particular car from Maharashtra. Will probably be launched to a soft-enclosure of round two hectares within the core areas of Similipal tonight and will likely be saved on commentary for round seven days,” Odisha Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (Wildlife), Susanta Nanda, informed The Indian Specific on Sunday.
Another tigress from a tiger reserve in Maharashtra will likely be delivered to STR quickly as a part of the undertaking, officers stated.
In 2018, the Odisha authorities had made a tiger translocation try with the purpose of bringing the massive cats again to the Satkosia Tiger Reserve, which not has tigers. Accordingly, one male tiger, Mahavir, from Kanha and one feminine, Sundari, from Bandhavgarh in Madhya Pradesh had been translocated to Satkosia. Whereas the male tiger died after falling right into a lure laid by poachers, the feminine was despatched again to its authentic habitat after it allegedly killed two individuals throughout its 30-month keep in Odisha.
