Amid a probe order by the Odisha forest minister into the unnatural deaths of round 50 elephants within the state within the final six months, a senior forest and wildlife official on Tuesday stated the state’s elephant inhabitants is going through a extreme habitat crunch, resulting in meals shortages, rising human-animal conflicts and declining animal well being.
On a median, 83 elephants die yearly as a result of varied causes equivalent to illness, electrocution, prepare mishaps, poisoning, and looking. (File Picture)
Principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife) Susanta Nanda on Tuesday stated Odisha has round 2,100 elephants, roughly 400 greater than the area required to sustainably accommodate them.
“A study was earlier conducted by the elephant center of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru. Sustainably, 1,700 jumbos can safely be accommodated in Odisha forests without human-animal conflict. The overcrowding has led to ecological stress, with limited availability of food, water, and living space, which in turn reduces the elephants’ disease resistance and can lead to higher rates of bacterial infections, especially among young calves and juveniles,” Nanda stated.
“Since we have over 2,100 elephants, we are witnessing a surge in human-animal conflicts as elephants encroach on human settlements in search of food and space. Around 1,700-1,800 elephants can at most be sustained and managed within the larger forested landscapes of Odisha with tolerable levels of elephant-human conflicts. Therefore, it becomes important to have a pragmatic vision for long-term conservation of elephants in the state considering this fact,” Nanda stated.
To ease the scenario, the federal government is exploring the potential of relocating some elephants to Similipal sanctuary in Mayurbhanj district, which might present extra protected habitat for part of the elephant inhabitants. Nonetheless, Nanda famous that the core inhabitants of two,000-2,100 elephants will doubtless stay in Odisha.
Nanda stated Odisha would conduct its personal elephant census from November 14 to evaluate not solely the resident elephant inhabitants, but in addition transient elephants from neighbouring states, equivalent to Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, which often wander into Odisha. The findings will assist to higher perceive and handle Odisha’s elephant conservation challenges.
Odisha has been witnessing rising ranges of human-elephant battle over the previous three many years as a result of habitat loss and fragmentation of habitats by anthropogenic actions equivalent to infrastructure tasks, mining, growth of roads, railway strains and electrical strains and likewise biotic stress from forest dependent communities. On a median, 83 elephants die yearly as a result of varied causes equivalent to illness, electrocution, prepare mishaps, poisoning, and looking. The human elephant battle in Odisha claims round 112 human lives yearly.