The State Forest Department has finally succeeded in translocation of seven Swam deer from Kanha Tiger Reserve to Van Vihar National Park here on Thursday.
This is a significant step towards conservation of Ground Swamp Deer specie of Swamp Deer, which is on the verge of extinction. Barasingha has the honour of being State Animal of Madhya Pradesh. The swamp deer brought under supervision of forest officers and doctors in a specially built vehicle have been housed in conservation breeding enclosure prepared for them in Van Vihar.
For translocation of swam deer from Kanha Tiger Reserve to Van Vihar, capture strategy was chalked out after obtaining permission of Central and State Governments. Capture process had begun in Kanha Tiger Reserve on January 7 from 6 am. Till 12.30 pm, seven barasinghas were captured in specially built Boma and were sent to Bhopal.
Capture process was led by Additional Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) Suhas Kumar Jain and Zonal Director of Kanha Tiger Reserve Jasbir Singh Chouhan. Shubhranjan Sen of Indian Wildlife Institute Dehradun, Director Centre for Wildlife Forensic and Health AB Shrivastaa, doctor of Van Vihar Bhopal Dr. Atul Gupta, Assistant Director of Kanha Tiger Reserve Rajneesh Kumar Singh and Dr. Sandeep Agrawal extended special cooperation the capture operation.
The move is being taken to ensure that the Barasinghas do not become extinct in case of an outbreak of a disease at the tiger reserve spread over Mandla and Balaghat districts of Madhya Pradesh. Right now, there were around 550 Barasinghas in Kanha tiger reserve. In 1967, the population of Barasinghas dipped to an all time low of 66. Some wildlife experts suspect that they fell prey to tigers and other carnivores due to their inability to enter deep forests as they have huge antlers. The successful translocation has paved way for another bid to shift 50 more Barasinghas from Kanha to Satpura Tiger Reserve, a senior forest official said.