Amrabad - Telangana's Tiger Country Sees a Boom in Numbers

Hyderabad: The Amrabad tiger reserve in Telangana is fast turning into prime tiger country with officials reporting that it is now home to at least 34 tigers, up from 21 reported after the 2022 census.

“Of these 34 tigers, 11 are male, 15 female, and eight are cubs. While 22 tigers matched with the existing database, four were recorded for the first time. This is the best possible news for Telangana and its efforts for protecting tigers,” a senior forest department official said.

Officials said that the actual numbers may be even higher than the 34 recorded by camera traps if once took into consideration younger cubs that their mothers are very careful about when it comes to their movement. “We should not be surprised if we end up counting at least 10 to 14 more in the months to come, putting the Amrabad tiger population at nearly 50. This is a phenomenal turnaround for a forest that saw just seven tigers reported being from the entire reserve as recently as 2018,” an official said.

The 10 ranges of the reserve were clubbed into four blocks and the camera traps data gathered for month from each of these blocks. Block 1, comprising three forest ranges that are considered the lower plateau of the reserve, as well as the Block 3 between Amrabad and Domalapenta ranges, have higher tiger density.

The Phase IV monitoring is the final phase of the exercise to determine tiger numbers and the numbers of animals including leopards. This phase involved using camera traps in 903 locations across the reserve with 1,806 of these cameras installed in pairs in two-sq. km grids. Since the entire forest area cannot be covered at once, the reserve was divided into four blocks and the camera traps were kept in each location in a block for 30 days.

The exercise began in December 2023 and was completed in May 2024. In addition, there were also extensive ‘sign surveys’ – checking for pug marks, scrapes on trees, scats in each of the 2 sq km grids.

The camera traps exercise also captured images of leopard, sloth bear, Indian wolf, wild dog, golden jackal, nilgai, chital, sambar, chinkara, four-horned antelope, common langur, Rhesus macaque, and several bird and reptiles showcasing the rich biodiversity in terms of animal life in the Amrabad Tiger Reserve, officials said.

Tigers in Amrabad over the years

Year – Tigers in ATR

2017 – 10

2018 – 7

2019 – 12

2020 – 12

2021 - 14

2022 – 21

2023 – 24

2024 – 34

Huge spread

Amrabad is spread over undivided Mahbubnagar and Nalgonda districts and is about 150 km south of Hyderabad on the northern bank of Krishna river. This reserve, nestled in the Nallamala hill range, has a core zone of 2,166.37 sq km and a buffer area of 445.02 sq km.