With Himachal’s Pong wetland witnessing a sharp decline in mortality rate of birds due to outbreak of avian influenza-H5N1, State’s Forest Department has decided to go ahead with the two-day long annual waterfowl count starting February 1 at the water body.
As many as 4,986 migratory birds have fallen victim to the deadly virus till now at Pong wetland in Kangra district. A large number of native birds like crows and pigeons have also died.
Following the detection of bird flu at Pong Dam on January 4, all kinds of human and livestock activities were banned in one km area around the Pong lake which is declared as alert zone (red zone) while the next nine km area was declared a surveillance zone.
Earlier it was decided to suspend the annual waterfowl count for this year at Pong Dam but the Department will now undertake the two-day census exercise with the help of its own field staff on February 1 and 2.
Notably, the bird flu has been reported for the first time at Pong Lake, which hosts more than one lakh winged guests every winter season. The migratory birds from Central Asia and Siberian reach Pong Dam every year by October for their winter sojourn and stay till March.
“The daily fatality reported at Pong Lake due to the bird flu is three-four birds now. The situation is under control but considering the bird flu alert, the Wildlife division of the Forest Department has decided to conduct the annual waterfowl count through its own staff this year. The wildlife experts from the state or outside will not be involved in the two-day exercise,” said Rahul Rohane, Deputy Conservator of Forests, Wildlife Division, Hamirpur while talking to The Pioneer.
He said that the area of wetland is divided in 26 sections for the census exercise and different teams would be deputed. The field staff would take all the precautions. Earlier in mid-December, around 56000 migratory birds of more than 50 species were counted by the field staff at the Pong Lake.”
Giving details of fatalities due to bird flu at Pong, Rohane said that the total fatalities in 38 species of migratory birds stood at 4986. Of them, 90 percent deaths have been reported among Bar-Headed Goose, he added.
According to the census exercise conducted in January 2020, as many as 1,15,701 birds of 114 species were recorded at the Pong Dam Lake. The figure included 1,04,032 migratory waterfowls of 60 species, 10,377 resident water birds of 30 species and 1,292 birds of 24 other local species.
The Pong Lake had recorded an increase by 68 percent in the number of Bar-Headed Geese in 2020 as compared to the previous year. The count of Bar-Headed Geese was 49,496 in 2019-20 as compared to 29,443 in the 2018-19 census exercise conducted in January every year. Other dominant species recorded included Northern Pintail (12,881), Eurasian Coot (10,860), Common Teal (7,334), Common Pochard (3,988), Northern Shoveler (2,818), Great Cormorant (2,121), Eurasian Wigeon (1,350) and Ruddy Shelduck (1,028).
The Pong Dam, about 100 kms from Dharamshala, is known as Pong Reservoir, Pong Dam Lake and the Maharana Pratap Sagar. It was created in 1975, by building the highest earth fill dam in India on the Beas river in the wetland zone of the Shivalik hills.
The site is a well-known wildlife sanctuary and one of the international wetland sites declared in India by the Ramsar Convention. The reservoir covers an area of 60,610 acres and the wetland portion is 38,700 acres.
