Category : Wildlife | Location : Haryana | Posted on 2021-04-13 00:50:53
| The Wildlife Institute of India (WII), Dehradun Monday started the 2021 Wildlife Census in Haryana covering the states’ all protected forest areas along with outside areas of these protected forests. The wildlife census will be held in two phases including preparation and training phases, and execution phase. The census will conclude on July 30. A team of WII headed by the senior researcher Athar Noor took the first training session for the field staff personnel along with senior state wildlife officials in Pinjore, Panchkula. Training sessions for the field staff are being organized throughout Haryana. The census for the wild animals being held with three objectives including to assess abundance and distribution of major mammalian carnivore population and prey population inside the protected areas, to assess abundance and distribution of nilgai and rhesus macaque in a human dominating landscape that is outside the Protected Areas (PAs), and to assess the status of major avian species like peafowl, red junglefowl, and sarus crane. Researcher Athar Noor said, “The field survey will start once we trained all the field workers in different techniques including the camera trapping.” A wildlife officer added, “Around one-month long census includes three days only for surveying macaques (monkeys), nilgai and blackbuck outside the PA using an online mobile application Wildlife Census Haryana. The mobile application was especially designed for survey of macaques and later nilgai (blue bull) and lackbuck was also included for the online survey.” The Haryana Wildlife Department has deputed IFS M L Rajvanshi, and senior deputy wildlife warden, Shyam Sundar, as the state coordinators. The training sessions for the beat staff are scheduled to be held in four different circles including Panchkula, Rohtak, Gurugram and Hisar. WII, Dehradun, and Haryana Wildlife Department have marked at least 97 beats for collecting the samples of wild animals. 59 beats out of 97 are in Shivalik Hills spreading throughout forest areas in Panchkula, Yamunanagar, Ambala. Other 38 beats are in Aravali Hills in Gurgaon, Rewari, Jhajjar etc. The wildlife survey will conduct through modern techniques including the distance sampling, line transects, installation of camera traps. Traditional methods including reading of pug marks will also be used in the survey. | |||
| SOURCE : https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/chandigarh/wildlife-census-in-haryana-kicks-off-to-conclude-in-july-7270850/ |
