Officials gear up for monsoon
With less than a week left for the Pench Tiger Reserve to be closed for tourists during the monsoon season, the park managers have started gearing up for a long period of strict surveillance to keep a check on poachers and fishermen and also to stop illegal grazing and felling of trees in the sprawling tiger habitat closely identified with Rudyard Kipling’s famous Jungle Book character Mowgli.
The sky has been overcast and it has been raining frequently in this area over the past few days. Now it is time for fresh leaves to sprout. Soon the tall barren teak trees and climbers will be covered with layers and layers of green canopy and the tropical dry deciduous Pench forest would be filled with plenty of green cover that would be accentuated with a grassy carpet and shrubs — all this would provide an ideal breeding ground for diverse wildlife — with the grand tiger sitting at the apex of the biotic pyramid.
The core area of Pench Tiger Reserve stretches over an area of 411 square kilometre. Of this, the Pench National Park is spread over 292.85 sq kilometre and the area of Pench Sanctuary is 118.307 kilometre. A buffer zone stretching over an area of 768.302 square kilometre in Seoni and Chhindwara districts encircles almost three-fourth of the park boundary.
Pench Tiger Reserve field director Alok Kumar told this newspaper that they would be intensifying beat surveillance on foot during the rainy season and not a single part of the tiger reserve would be spared from this operation. He said that they will make extra efforts to keep an eye on any suspicious movement in this habitat. Since there are no villages in the core area, it would not be difficult to keep track on outside elements who might try to illegally enter the area, he said adding the park faces the challenge of grazing. Since the Pench river dries up during the summer season and there are a large number of water bodies, there is always the danger of the poachers poisoning the water holes and carcass.
The estimated tiger population in Pench Tiger Reserve, as per the 2010 estimation exercise, is anywhere between 53 and 78.
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