The Panna Tiger Reserve authorities on Friday succeeded in putting a radio collar and bringing under surveillance one of the two semi-adult 21-month-old male tigers born to T1 —one of the two tigresses brought to Panna from Bandhavgarh and Kanha in March 2009 under the ambitious plan to repopulate the Panna habitat following extinction of tigers from this area.
According to Panna Tiger Reserve field director Srinivas Murthy, it was felt necessary on the basis of earlier experience that the semi-adult tiger needed a protective shield at the time of “dispersal” and hence the decision was taken to radio collar the tiger born to T1. Till now, tigers brought to Panna have been named as T1, T2 and T3 for identification purpose. The role of these tigers brought from other tiger reserves would be written in golden letters when the history of repopulating the Panna Tiger Reserve shall be written, Mr Murthy said but at the same time emphasised the need to identify the new generation of tigers born to the founder population with Panna.