Nicknamed as Panna-213(23), this three year old big cat was posing threat to cattle grazing around buffer zone of Panna Tiger Reserve and its movement was also near the villages. “ The movement of tigress had been between core and buffer zone. The cases of cattle killed by it had also increased. As it was also roaming around the villages, hence we felt that it would be better to shift it. The translocation process was started early Saturday morning and by 4 pm, tigress was sent to Satpura Tiger Reserve along with a team of wildlife specialists, said Field Director of Panna Tiger Reserve to ‘The Hitavada’.

Panna Tiger Reserve said that tigress Panna 213 (23) was radio collared on October 16, 2015. For the last few months, this tigress’ movement had started around village Koni, Bilhata, Gahdara, etc. Its regular movement towards buffer from core had perturbed the officials of Panna Tiger Reserve. As the forest density is not good in buffer zone and villages exist near the buffer zone, decision was taken by reserve authorities to shift the tigress to Satpura Tiger Reserve. With this, now Panna Tiger Reserve has thirty plus population of big cats.

Talking to ‘The Hitavada’, Field Director of Satpura Tiger Reserve, A K Nagar said that the tigress, which was brought from Panna Tiger Reserve, had been successfully released into the jungles of the reserve. Now the population of big cat in Satpura Tiger Reserve has reached around twenty-two. “The big cat was released into reserve during noon hours,” said sources.