Forest dept claims tigress spotted in Panna Reserve

The Pioneer , Thursday, February 21, 2008
Correspondent : Staff Reporter
Countering news reports that tourists did not find any tigress in the Panna Reserve for the past four month, Madhya Pradesh Principal Chief Wildlife Warden PB Gangopadhyay on Wednesday claimed female tigers are still there in the national park.

Gangopadhyay said, "Unnecessary controversy is being created in this regard. A team has visited the Panna Reserve recently and found a female tiger there." However, he didn't elaborate on the number of big cats left in the Panna Reserve, which once boasted of having 300 tigers during the princely era.

Wildlife expert Raghu Chundawat, who had carried out research in the Panna Tiger Reserve for a long time, had recently claimed that tigers were on the verge of extinction in Panna.

"No female tiger has been spotted by tourists in the Panna Tiger Reserve in the past four month, sparking fears of the animal being wiped out of the tiger reserve," Chundawat said. On the sharp decline in the number of tigers in Madhya Pradesh, as per the latest tiger census, from 710 to 300, Gangopadhyay said tiger population had reduced due to the loss of natural habitat.

"There is no habitat outside tiger reserve area where the animal can breathe freely as there are population pressure on land and disturbance on forest area. Besides, these habitats are isolated and not connected," he said. Gangopadhyay said re-location of villages in tiger reserve areas is being carried out in order to preserve tiger habitats. Besides, steps are being taken up to curb poaching.

On whether the present system of estimation by camera trapping was more accurate than pugmark estimation, and whether tiger population had been exaggerated during previous census, he said the present methodology provided better picture.

"However, both methods could not be compared and depletion could not be denied. More accurate picture could be known after the next census," he added.

Meanwhile, Van Vihar National Park Director JS Chouhan said a wounded tiger brought here from Satna was recuperating and was quite better. The tiger had received a gunshot wound injury near the spine. "There is no threat to its life but it would take time to recover," he said.

 
SOURCE : The Pioneer, Thursday, 21 February 2008
 


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