Environment & Ecology
Preliminary Analysis of Cheetah Mortalities at Kuno National Park Point to Natural Causes: NTCA
- As per National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), Global experience suggests that initial phase of reintroduction of Cheetah in African countries has resulted in more than 50% mortality of introduced Cheetahs.
- Mortality may happen due to intra-species fights, diseases, injury caused during hunting of prey, poaching, road hits, poisoning and predatory attack by other predators etc.
NTCA
- A statutory body under Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, is entrusted with implementation of Project Cheetah.
Project Cheetah
- A total of 20 radio collared Cheetahs were brought from Namibia and South Africa to Kuno National Park (KNP), Madhya Pradesh, in a first ever transcontinental wild to wild translocation.
Challenges
- Having cheetahs for extended periods in quarantine may affect their adaptive capabilities and cause them to have psychological adjustment problems, making them more vulnerable.
- Unlike tigers and leopards, cheetahs are relatively delicate animals and are more likely to be fatally injured in the wild.
- Lack of space and prey at KNP, given that Cheetah is a courser and needs large distances.
Cheetah
- World’s fastest mammal, is a keystone species (organism that helps define an entire ecosystem) of dry forests, scrub forests, and savannahs.
- Protected under Appendix 1 of CITES.
IUCN status:
- African Cheetah -Vulnerable
- Asiatic Cheetah – Critically endangered
