Madhya Pradesh now plans to shift tigers to Panna reserve

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Bhopal (IANS): Having successfully shifted two tigresses to Panna Tiger Reserve recently, the Madhya Pradesh forest department now plans to move a tiger too there as the sanctuary’s sole male tiger is untraceable, officials said.

The only male tiger found during a Wildlife Institute of India (WII) survey using the camera trap method in December last year, is untraceable now, a forest department official said.

According to the department, the tiger, which has not been seen for the past 25 days, could have wandered off into neighbouring forests in Chhattarpur. “It was last seen on Feb 14,” the official told IANS.

Queried about the plan to move tigers to Panna, the state’s Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) H.S. Pabla told IANS on Tuesday: “We are not in a hurry. The two tigresses brought to Panna will take about a month to adjust to their new environs. If the male tiger is not spotted by then, we will also bring in male tigers.”

However, Mr. Pabla refused to divulge from where the tigers would be brought. “We have ample resources, including Bandhavgarh and Kanha, and the decision will be taken at an appropriate time,” he said.

In the recent past, the state forest department shifted one tigress each from the Bandhavgarh and Kanha National Parks to Panna Tiger Reserve for the lone reported tiger there, to increase the number of big cats which has gone down drastically in the past one year or so.

Mr. Pabla on Monday told reporters, after a tigress was shifted from Kanha in an Indian Air Force chopper: “We do not know where the tiger is. The WII has conducted a survey and we are waiting for the report.”

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