Ecology and Prey Abundance of Tiger (Panthera tigiris) in the Sathyamangalam Forest Division, Tamilnadu.(May 2009)

Principal Investigator: Dr. B. Ramakrishnan and Mr.S.Tamilvanan.

Funded by: OSAI Environmental organization

PROJECT SUMMARY

As a “Flagship species”, the tiger a highly endangered and a charismatic animal play a major role in the forest ecosystem for biodiversity conservation. As an apex species in an ecosystem, Tiger is an indicator of the richness in biodiversity of an area. Currently about 3,00,000 km2 of tiger habitat remains in India, of this only 93,700 km2 is occupied by tiger. Presently most of the study has been done in protected areas i.e Tiger Reserves, Wildlife Sanctuaries and National Parks. Many reserve forest areas which also have potential for the survival of tiger lacks baseline information on tigers.

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Considering the lacuna, this present study was carryout in the Sathyamangalam forest division to establish the ecological parameters, like population, occupancy index, prey base available, feeding ecology and to suggest feasible management recommendations for the long-term conservation of tigers in this forest divisions. During this study all the five ranges in Sathyamangalam Forest division was covered.

Taking various factors in to account, pug mark method, prey encounter rate and scat analysis were used during the survey. The result showed the presence of nine individual tigers identified from twelve sets of pug mark, which occupied about 847.87 Sq.Km out of 1455.31 Sq.km of the Sathyamangalam Forest Division.

Totally 469 Km was covered by foot to estimate the prey base abundance of tiger in the Sathyamangalam Forest Division. Spotted deer abundance was more in two ranges viz. Bhavanisagar (58.56 Kg/km) and Sathyamangalam (45.12 Kg/km). On the contrary, Gaur was recorded more in other three ranges Viz. Talavadi (243 Kg/km) followed by Hasanur (81 Kg/km) and T N Palayam (36 Kg/km).

To know the feeding ecology of tiger, scat analysis was performed. Totally 23 tiger scats were collected and analyzed. Five species of prey remains were found in varying proportion. In that sambar deer was found in higher proportion than any other prey species in all five ranges, followed by spotted deer, wild bore and black napped hare.

This present study results revealed the ecology of tiger, though not in all aspects, the results gives some important information that could possibly explain population of tigers, distribution of its prey and also the feeding patterns of tigers. Since a part of Sathyamangalam Forest division was now declared as wildlife sanctuary, and was not exposed to similar kind of study in the past. The outcome of the present study is definitely considered to be the milestone for the conservation of the Charismatic Species in Sathyamangalam Forest Division.

For detailed report contact OSAI.