The bi-annual six-day wildlife monitoring exercise, also called as pre-monsoon survey, carried out to estimate carnivores and herbivores, began in all the 10 ranges in Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve (STR) in Erode district on Monday.
Under Phase IV monitoring of tiger reserves by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), the pre-monsoon survey is done between June and July and the post-monsoon survey in December-January every year.
As many as 300 personnel began the exercise in 10 ranges in the Sathyamangalam Division and in Hasanur Division that comes under STR. Each beat comprising four to six members of forest watchers, guards and anti-poaching watchers (APWs) will be involved in direct sighting of animals from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. and from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. besides recording pug marks, dung, carcass of animals, tree bark peelings, vegetations including grass, herbs, sedges species and tree species.
The teams will also carry out line transect surveys on alternative days where 2 km lines are charted parallel to each other and the transect are walked to detect the movement of animals. The collected data are recorded in the Monitoring System for Tigers – Intensive Protection and Ecological Status (M-STrIPES) app for analysis by the NTCA and the Wildlife Institute of India (WII).
The core or critical tiger habitat in STR is 793.49 sq.km. The buffer or peripheral area is 614.91 sq.km. It has a significant population of tiger, elephants, leopards, black buck, gaur, four horned antelope, striped hyena, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fishes and other creatures.
