Chennai: An injured juvenile cinereous vulture that was rescued near Nagercoil during Cyclone Ockhi in 2017 was taken to Machia Biological Park in Jodhpur on Thursday for acclimatization prior to its planned release into the wild at the nearby “Keru” cattle carcass dumping site in Rajasthan.
The officials of the Kanniyakumari Forest Division, who rescued the vulture at Asaripallam in Nagercoil, named it ‘Ochki,’ after the devastating cyclone during which it was found stranded, and gave proper veterinary care before nurturing it at the Udayagiri biodiversity park in the district.
After the vulture completely recovered and grew into an adult, thanks to the sincere efforts and meticulous care provided by the forest staff, the authorities decided to release it into the wild to ensure its right to life, an official press release said.
Cinereous Vultures are long-distance migrant and high-altitude flyers that are also social animals living in flocks. The juvenile ‘Ochki’ vulture might have drifted with air currents and landed near Nagercoil.
Since adult vultures depend on thermals or air currents for lift off and soaring in the sky, the juvenile, in the absence of such thermals, may have got stranded then.
Now that it was fit to join the other Cinereous vultures, it was suggested that the captive vulture be transported to Rajasthan and released into the wild. So, after obtaining permission from the Rajasthan Chief Wildlife Warden, it was taken to Jodhpur for subsequent release into the Keru site.
The Keru site is ideal for release of the captive vulture not only because of the presence of other Cinereous vultures but also because of ready availability of food. Before the release into the Keru site, the vulture has been tagged by the Wildlife Institute of India in Dehradun to enable its tracking in the wild.
Since the bird will have to travel around 2600 km from Kanyakumari, it was decided to transport it by air and permission was obtained from the Ministry of Civil Aviation to take the vulture in a special flight, for the first time in the country.
With necessary clearance and logistics support from Air India staff at Chennai, New Delhi and Jodhpur airports, the vulture was finally transported in a special cage designed with proper ventilation and space as per IATA Live animal regulations.
From Kanyakumari district it was taken by road on October 30 to Arignar Anna Zoological Park in Vandalur, where it was kept for acclimatization till November 3, before being taken by the Air India flight from Chennai to Jodhpur.
