Tigress and her three cubs are doing fine in the Bhagwan Birsa Biological park commonly known as Ranchi Zoo during lockdown when visitors are banned totally here, said chief conservator of forest cum director of this zoo D Venkateswarlu.

Venkateswarlu said the tigress Anushka gave birth to a litter of three cubs on the night of April 18 in the zoo here and she and her three cubs are having a good day every day since then.

Director said the mother is extremely protective and obsessive of them and not even for a while she likes to be  away from her off springs.

On her becoming mother second time to which Venkateswarlu said, “ I was not then in this zoo when Anushka had her first shot of 3 cubs in April 2018. However my officials have told me this time on becoming second term mother she is proving a better one and handles her babies with more ease and comfort.”

He said, “Cub management by mother is a fine art and she has learnt the finesse of it much faster. More maturity has come to her in regard to her cub upbringing and this makes us also cheerful”.

Venkateswarlu said, “Anushka had had her bout of tragedy then in her first delivery. She lost one of her three cubs then. Had it not occurred then our zoo would have been far richer now with its survival then.”

However, the director made it clear the death of the cub then was not for any flawed service or care but for its generic obstructive bile duct issue that the survival was lost.

Zoo’s noted veterinary doctor Ajay Kumar said, “A cub which is suckling milk from mother does not get problem of obstruction of bile duct. It arises after three months of the birth when a cub begins eating. It is more a problem by birth.”

Venkateswarlu said, “I was told that Anushka had denied taking food for three days after her production of three cubs in 2018. However, this second motherhood she had no problem at all. She ate her food right from day one of the delivery.”

Ajay Kumar said, “We had watched this food denial tendency of Anushka in her first delivery in 2018. We were closely monitoring her food habit. We made a change. We dropped giving her buffalo beef.”

“We began giving her chicken from day one of her second motherhood. It clicked. She relished our chicken like anything. It is roughly 6 Kg chicken a day for her.” said Ajay Kumar.

Venkateswarlu on upkeep of hygiene prevailing in the zoo at this time of covid 19 said our all efforts are on. We have limited interaction between our keepers and animals here.

As for zoo keepers there are all protective gears like head gear, shoe cover, gloves, masks etc and for animals the arrangements are too exhaustive as virocidal called silver nano compound is used for spraying the area with flaming mechanism in the retiring cell of the animals said Venkateswarlu.

Ajay Kumar said “ Silver nano compound is non hazardous and non corrosive nevertheless our aim remains to use minimum chemicals where animals reside . We go for flaming”.

Explaining flaming Ajay Kumar said “ We do this in retiring cell where animals spend nights. Here we arrange flame with the help of small LPG gas cylinder with all care and protection.”

He said a 6 to 8 inch flame is generated and that gives immense comfort and luxury to the animals and tiger/ tigress and their cubs as well.