Chennai: Adding one more feather to its conservation cap, the State government notified an area of 686.405 sq km of reserve forests in Krishnagiri and Dharmapuri Districts as ‘Cauvery South Wildlife Sanctuary,’ which will connect Cauvery North Wildlife Sanctuary in the State with the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary in Karnataka, thus forming a large, contiguous network of protected areas for wildlife.
An official press release said the notification made under Sec 26-A of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972, on Tuesday had come close on the heels of a series of notifications on Kazhuveli Bird Sanctuary in Villupuram and Cuddalore districts, Nanjarayan Bird Sanctuary in Tiruppur District, Kadavur Slender Loris Sanctuary in Karur and Dindigul Districts and Dugong Conservation Reserve in Palk Bay.
The region covering the Cauvery sanctuary has a unique ecological, faunal, and floral significance and is an important elephant habitat in Southern India. The area is critical for a large number of riverine species dependent on River Cauvery like Leith's Soft-shelled turtles, Smooth-coated Otter and marsh crocodile.
The landscape maintains continuity with the Nilgiris Biosphere through Malai
Mahadeshwara Wildlife Sanctuary, Billigiri Rangaswamy Temple (BRT) Tiger
Reserve in Karnataka and Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve, which provides sufficient area for the conservation of the varied and rich biodiversity of the region.
Efforts taken to conserve tigers in the contiguous areas such as BRT Tiger Reserve, Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve have created a spill over effect and tigers have begun to occupy their traditional ranges where they had been locally extinct for a few decades.
It will also support the conservation of leopards and other red-listed large carnivores. This area has two important and large elephant corridors namely, the Nandimangalam - Ulibanda Corridor and the Kovaipallam - Anebiddahalla Corridor, the release said.
The new sanctuary is rich in biodiversity with at least 35 species of mammals and 238 species of birds and the forests forming a unique ecosystem of the Cauvery basin, constituting the last forested low-lying stretches of River Cauvery ahead of its entry into the Stanley Reservoir.
