Special teams from the Animal Resources Development and Forest Departments and the OUAT will conduct a thorough field investigation in the Madhupur forest area in Khordha district where 20 peacocks, a crow and a heron were found dead on Tuesday.
The ARD and Forest Departments’ team is already on the location while four more teams from the Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT) belonging to medicine, pathology, poultry and biochemistry will join it soon.
In another development, Khordha forest officials will go to the Animal Disease Research Institute (ADRI) of the State ARD Department and the National Institute of High Security Animal Diseases (NIHSD), Bhopal with the swab samples of the deceased birds to find out the reason for the deaths.
Forest officials have sent the birds’ carcasses to the OUAT for postmortem.
Khordha Forest Ranger Dillip Kumar Rout said a joint team of Chandaka and Khordha range officials are doing a field investigation in the forest to see if there have any other deaths of other birds and animals in the forest. He, however, ruled out the poisoning angle.
According to locals, about 400 to 500 peacocks live in the Madhupur forest and the deaths are an unprecedented incident.