Two young male tigers spotted in Mulugu and Bhupalpally forests, signaling a new habitat expansion in Telangana’s tiger corridor
Hyderabad: Just a few months ago there were none. Then there was one. Now there are two. In the process, the forests of the former Warangal district appear to slowly become a new home for tigers. After a sub-adult male tiger first made its way into Mulugu district in December last after which it has more or less stayed put there, another young male has now arrived in the forests of the neighbouring Jayashankar Bhupalpally district.
This could be the beginning of a new forest sink spread over the belt of Bhupalapally, Mulugu, Mahbubabad, and Bhadradri Kothagudem districts for young tigers from the now-established tiger corridor forests in KB Asifabad and Mancherial districts to the north. The tigers are striking out in search of new territories, forest department officials say.
“We have seen for the past several years tigers from Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh come to Asifabad and Mancherial. Now we are possibly seeing those that settled here and are breeding, are having their offspring moving further south,” a forest department official said.
“We first got a report of pug marks ten days ago from one of our officers and they indeed turned out to be that of a tiger,” according to JS Bhupalpally district forest officer M. Naveen Reddy. With a tiger already moving between Mulugu and Bhadradri Kothagudem districts, pug marks from both areas were cross-checked and it was determined that the tiger in JS Bhupalpally was a different one.
“We believe this is the same tiger that was reported earlier in Peddapalli and Karimnagar districts and has now reached our district,” Naveen Reddy said. This particular sub-adult male, he said, is one that was born in Mancherial forests, and moved southwards, likely in search of a new territory.
With tiger presence confirmed in the district, two special teams of staff have been formed to track its movements. “Though the tiger has not gone close to any village and has been moving only inside the forest areas, our staff have been tom-tomming in villages in the area alerting people to the tiger in the forest just as a matter of abundant precaution. It has been many years since a tiger was seen in these forests,” he said.
Meanwhile, the tiger that was first seen in Mulugu in early December last, and which was determined to have come down all the way from Pamed wildlife sanctuary in Chhattisgarh, has more or less made itself at home in Mulugu, Mahbubabad, and Bhadradri-Kothagudem districts. Like a typical male tiger that has a large territory, it has so far covered an area of around 200 sq km in these districts and appears to prefer to move in that area. It is taking around 20 days or so to make one circuit of the area, officials said.
“So far, it has not come into any conflict with people, and has been feeding on wild boar and other animals in the forest. We have two teams of dedicated animal trackers who are following the tiger. We look for at least one sign of its presence every day in the forests, either a camera trap image, a pug mark, or reports of it being heard or seen by people. And that location is used to track it further,” Rahul Jadhav, the Mulugu DFO said.
