Tamil Nadu intends to reintroduce the Nilgiri tahr in the Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve after 50 years

COIMBATORE: The TN Forest Department intends to reintroduce the state animal in the reserve’s deep forests, fifty years after the Nilgiri tahr was last seen in Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve (STR).

The department is locating acceptable housing in STR where the tahrs may live, along with enough food and the ideal elevation. While Nilgiris tahrs have been seen in 140 blocks of Mudumalai Tiger Reserve, Anamalai Tiger Reserve, Srivilliputhur Megamalai Tiger Reserve, and Kalakad Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve, STR is the only reserve in the state without them as of right now.

Project Nilgiri Tahr director M. G. Ganesan said that after the reintroduction is completed, STR will also be able to claim to have provided homes for the state animal.
This effort is a component of the 25 crore ‘Project Nilgiri Tahr’ that the Tamil Nadu government is carrying out. However, the reintroduction procedure does not yet have a timeframe set by the forest department. “Our goal is to locate grassy slopes in STR that provide the ideal environment for Nilgiri tahrs. We will provide it in STR after a thorough analysis,” Ganesan said.

In the four tiger reserves in the state, there are around 3,100 Nilgiri tahrs.
The four tiger reserves in the state are home to an estimated 3,100 Nilgiri tahrs, according to forest authorities’ estimates.
The population of Nilgiri tahr is declining, and forest authorities have identified a number of causes. First and foremost, tahrs make easy food for predators. Poaching comes second, followed by deaths from forest fires. The forest department of Tamil Nadu has planned to work with its Keralan counterparts to perform a nilgiri tahr census in the western ghats from April 29 to May 1.
We discovered that there were about a hundred different plant species that Nilgiri tahrs ate in STR. However, the Nilgiri tahr herd as a whole disappeared from the jungle. Ganesan said, “We intend to locate the habitats in the STR.”
He continued by saying that Nilgiri tahrs are seen in the western ghats at elevations between 400 and 2500 meters above mean sea level.
STR extends from the western ghats to the eastern ghats. Tahrs were seen in this area over fifty years ago, but they abruptly vanished. “Predators may have killed them or stolen them. Large-scale tahrs’ deaths from forest fires is another possibility, according to Ganesan.
According to forest authorities, around five pairs of tahrs will be released in STR.
The Nilgiri tahr’s habitats in the remaining four forest reserves are now being marked by the forest department, according to Chief Wildlife Warden Srinivas R Reddy. The reintroduction procedure would start when these sites are designated and a population estimate is completed.
In the meantime, the forest department has sent 20 samples of Nilgiri tahrs’ faecal pellets to the Advanced Institute for Wildlife Conservation (AIWC) in Vandalur, Chennai, so that DNA may be extracted and used to identify the plants that the tahrs consume. Upon identification, the plants would be planted in the designated areas.