The Endangered Species Project Uttar Pradesh Forest Department and Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA)- India has successfully released 62 three years old juvenile gharials in the Ghagra river in Bahraich District, on occasion of World Wildlife Day, 3 March . The Conservator Endangered Species Sanjay Srivastava while talking to "The Pioneer" said that for the first time the gharials have been released in two zones.
"There is a soft zone on which the gharials have been released and there is the mainstream wherein they have been released. The one on the soft spots will struggle for their survival and thus get accustomed to living in the environment. There will also be a postmonsoon survey carried out" said senior forest official Sanjay Srivastava. Shailendra Singh from the TSA while giving detailed information said that the Gharial is critically endangered species and facing serious risk of extinction with less than 1000 adults in the wild. The Released Gharial were hatched at Kukrail Gharial Rehabilitation centre in 2011 and were between 1.2-1.5 meters.
He said that prior to release a comprehensive habitat evaluation was conducted based on IUCN reintroduction and supplementation protocol. "A connected back-water was assessed as suitable release site due to presence of all essential habitat components and less fishing. For the First time in the history of Gharial conservation management in India, a robust post release monitoring system is being employed to study the survival and dispersal of captive juveniles into the wild. The Gharials were divided in two batches and one batch was "soft" release in an onsite enclosure to study the process and impact of acclimatization on the survival and compare the performance of soft and hard released batches" said Singh.
He said that Soft-release describes a gradual return to the wild whereby an animal receives support, shelter and food until it is entirely able to fend for itself. "This has been one of the population techniques for terrestrial wildlife and first time it’s being employed for any aquatic species especially crocodilian in India. All 62 animals were tagged with color-coded plastic cattle tags while 10 of them were radio-tagged with very high frequency radio-tags" he added.
The gharial will be monitored on daily basis by TSA researchers to gather biological and ecological information to further guide large-scale future supplementation/reintroduction plan on this alternated habitat. "Viable population of Gharial exists only on Chambal river besides a small population in Geruwa river in Katerniaghat Wildlife Sanctuary in the state of UP. It is imperative to find an alternate habitat for the Gharial in the state, where population could be established, as Chambal and Katerniaghat habitats could be attaining the maximum carrying capacity" said Singh.
The operation was conducted by TSA team - Dr Shailendra Singh, Bhasker Dixit, Dr Disha Sharma, Chaitra Baliga. Technical inputs were provided by Dr Jeff lang from Gharial Conservation Alliance.