The census has been conducted for the last two weeks, with the support of the Ministry of Forest and Soil Conservation and National Conservation Fund (NCF), according to officials at the PWR. [break]
A 14-member technical team, including two elephants named Indirakali and Raptikali to help maneuver members through the reserve, have been deployed for the census. The PWR has divided the 800-square kilometer area into six blocks in order to obtain an accurate count of the number of tigers left.
Officials said the elephants were required to avoid possible tiger attacks.
Baburam Yadav Gopali, conservation officer at the PWR, told myrepublica.com that it would take a minimum of 15 days to complete the census for just one block. He said the final census would be complete in three months time. “We are currently carrying out census in first block,” he said.
Upendra Lamichhane/MyRepublica.com
Related story
First round tiger count in Parsa wildlife reserve shows increas...
Gopali informed they have installed trapping cameras every two-kilometers to facilitate the census. Additionally, 50 automatic cameras have been installed in 25 various locations in the Reserve. Each camera has the capacity to snap nine photos per minute.
Megh Nath Lamichhane, a senior game scout of the technical team, said in using such modern methods, the census would give a record of the exact number of tigers left in the area. A census conducted earlier had recorded that there were eight tigers, but the PWR said its results were ‘unconvincing.’
Officials stated the census was obstructed by various wild animals, such as wild elephants dismantling automatic cameras tied to the stems of trees a few days ago.
Similar censuses of endangered tigers have also begun in other wildlife reserves in the country, according to Man Bahadur Lama, a technician with NCF.
