BHOPAL: The health of the fourth Cheetah cub and the last surviving at KNP is stable said officials on Friday.
“The fourth cub’s condition is stable. But it is very difficult to tell about the survival of any (ailing) animal. We are trying hard…,” KNP director Uttam Sharma while answering questions from media.
As per details from an insider, the cub is being given goat milk while he is under vigorous monitoring. Rigorous attempts are being made to save the only Namibian cheetah cub surviving.
India’s ambitious Cheetah reintroduction project faced a setback as three India-born Cheetah cubs died in the last week in KNP. The exact reason for the death of the cubs is yet to be ascertained. However, a forest officer blames the sweltering heat as one of the reasons. According to him, the temperature was above 45 degrees on the day the three cubs dies adding that the cubs were born in a hostile time of the year in terms of temperatures. In Namibia, he continued mentioning the cheetahs give birth to their offspring at the onset of the rainy season which is followed by winter. But since Jwala gave birth to four during summers, it is likely that the baby cheetahs couldn’t survive the heat.
Meanwhile, the center has set up an 11-member high-level committee to review and monitor the progress of the Cheetah project. Constituted by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), the Cheetah Project Steering Committee would review, progress, monitor, and advise on the Cheetah introduction to the Madhya Pradesh Forest Department and NTCA, according to an official statement.
Apart from Rajesh Gopal, Secretary General, Global Tiger Forum, and Indian experts and officials, the panel also includes African experts like Adrian Tordiffe, veterinary wildlife specialist from the University of Pretoria (South Africa), Laurie Marker from Namibia, Andrew John Fraser from South Africa, and Vincent van dan Merwe (manager of the Cheetah Metapopulation Project) in South Africa