Now, a palliative care unit for big cats in Kerala

The Forest and Wildlife Department is gearing as much as arrange an animal hospice and palliative care unit for big cats in Wayanad in view of the rise in circumstances of tigers straying into human settlements, particularly in the Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary.

The sanctuary is dwelling to greater than half the variety of tigers current in Kerala.

The animal hospice and palliative care unit, the primary such initiative in the State, can be arrange in the Kurichiad vary of forest below the sanctuary, Vijayananthan, Chief Conservator of Forest, Wildlife, Palakkad, stated.

“We are planning to set up the unit on five acre on the premises of Vanalakshmi, an abandoned pepper plantation of the department, at Pachadi in the Kurichiad forest range at an estimate of ₹78 lakh,” he stated.

“The unit will be a rehabilitation centre for major carnivores such as tigers and leopards and could hold four animals at a time,” he stated.

Under the undertaking, injured and diseased animals can be handled on the centre after capturing them. They will both be rehabilitated right here or launched into the wild after therapy. The development works have already been tendered and awarded, Mr. Vijayananthan stated including that the undertaking can be accomplished in three months.

Most of the felines that stray into human settlements are aged ones and won’t be able to hunt prey in the wild in case the division lets them out into the forest. Keeping tigers in the custody of the Forest Department is a problem as zoo authorities are certain by restrictions on preserving the captured felines in custody, he stated.

The division has captured 5 tigers from Wayanad, together with a nine-year-old tigress from a tribal settlement close to Pulpally on Sunday, in the previous two years after they strayed into settlements.

The tigress captured on Sunday is below statement.