Fifth post of the #Wildlife Week #Reintroduction Series.
Day 5 – Return of the #Barasingha to #Satpura #Tiger Reserve !!!
Swamp Deer commonly known as Barasingha have three subspecies, Wetland Barasingha, Hardground Barasingha and Eastern Barasingha.
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Day 5 – Return of the #Barasingha to #Satpura #Tiger Reserve !!!
Swamp Deer commonly known as Barasingha have three subspecies, Wetland Barasingha, Hardground Barasingha and Eastern Barasingha.
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Once #swamp #deer inhabited areas from Central India to the Godavari river in the south. Currently, they are found in five discrete populations in 3 regions of central, north-east and northern India.
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Before the 1950s, the number of Hard ground Barasingha was estimated to be around 3,000 in Banjar Valley of Kanha National Park (KNP). However, by the 1960s the number had dwindled to a meagre 66 due to expansion of #agricultural activities into barasingha habitats...
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... and extensive #poaching by tribals and hunters. The species became perilously close to #extinction in the state where it was the state #animal.
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The fast depleting #population alarmed the forest authorities and various conservation methods were implemented such as relocation of villages esp. Saunf village, #habitat improvement, #grassland management and captive breeding which led to an increase in their population.
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It was then decided that some of the individuals should also be shifted to other habitats within the KNP for the purpose of preservation. In the first instance, using the boma technique 7 barasingha were relocated to Van Vihar in #Bhopal.
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After the #success of this project, permission was sought from Environment, Forests and Climate Change Ministry to relocate 20 swamp deer from #Kanha tiger reserve to #Satpura tiger reserve, which had been part of its historical range of distribution.
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Habitat suitability study was conducted in which Bori range was found to be the best suited and a conservation breeding enclosure was thus built there. In 2014 the permission for capturing and relocating the swamp deer to #Bori reserve was granted.
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Since previous attempts to tranquilise Barasingha had failed this time the non-invasive #Boma capture technique was used and 20 individuals were captured and #relocated in three operations in 2015 and 2016.
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Their predator proof enclosure in Bori WLS was fortified with wallowing ponds and aquatic grasses. Further, 46 more individuals were relocated to Bori from Kanha between 2017 and 2020. Today the number of barasingha had increased to 94 in Bori.
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Some deer have been released from their enclosures into the open #forest and have begun colonizing their historical grazing grounds in the #Churna range of Satpura Tiger Reserve about 50km away from Bori.
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On similar lines Project Dol Horina was executed in #Assam by Wildlife Trust of India whereby the second population of Eastern Swamp deer was established in #Manas NP by transporting the animals from #Kaziranga.
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@moefcc @kanha_mandla @SLTPtigers @rameshpandeyifs @ranjeetnature @surenmehra @yamunajiye @skumarias02 @debadityo #wildlife #WildlifeWeek2022 #WildlifeWeek #wildlifephotography #nature #swampdeer @minforestmp @wti_org_india
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