Wednesday evening, Asha, formerly known as ‘F1’, strayed from the park’s buffer zone.

However, according to the official, Asha has now returned to the park.

The core territory of the Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh, India, is 748 square kilometers and the buffer zone is 488 square kilometers.

“On Wednesday evening, Asha strayed from the buffer zone. She continued to move further away, but on Thursday it began to return. She is now near to the buffer zone, according to the official.

In the first two weeks of April, Asha had previously ventured outside the park’s boundaries, but had returned on her own.

Asha, unlike Pavan, another cheetah that was relocated to the park, spends little time in agricultural fields and is readily distracted by humans, according to Kuno National Park officials.

By relocating cheetahs from Namibia and South Africa, India intends to increase the cheetah population in the country.

According to some wildlife specialists, a cheetah’s habitat needs to be approximately 100 square kilometers. However, the KNP, which presently houses 18 translocated cheetahs (two of which have died), may not have enough room. Nonetheless, another forest official has noted that it is difficult to determine the precise area required by a cheetah.

According to some sources, a female cheetah requires a habitat measuring 400 square kilometers. Nobody knows precisely how much space a cheetah requires because these animals have been extinct in India for seven decades. “We are still learning about their habits,” he explained.

On September 17, 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi supervised the release of the first group of eight cheetahs brought from Namibia and placed in quarantine enclosures at Kuno National Park.

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Sadly, one of the female cheetahs passed away due to a kidney condition. On February 18, a second group of twelve cheetahs from South Africa were imported and released into the park.

Unfortunately, one of the male cheetahs died of cardiopulmonary failure.

The post Cheetah ‘Asha’ strays out of Kuno national park again appeared first on Republic Aeon.

The Union environment ministry announced on Thursday that twelve cheetahs will arrive in India on Saturday from South Africa, bringing the total number of big cats in Madhya Pradesh’s Kuno National Park to twenty.

The seven male and five female cheetahs that arrived on Saturday are the second group of big cats to arrive in Kuno, which was once home to Asian cheetahs more than a century ago.

The C-17 Globemaster Cargo plane of the Indian Air Force that will transport 12 cheetahs from South Africa landed at Johannesburg’s OR Tambo airport on Thursday evening and is scheduled to depart late on Friday, according to an official with knowledge of the situation.

“They will arrive in MP at 11 a.m. on Saturday from South Africa. MP CM Chouhan and Union minister for environment, forests, and climate change Bhupender Yadav will later release them into the quarantine enclosures (bomas),” said Ramesh Gupta, the state’s chief of forest force (HoFF).

Three male and one female cheetahs from Phinda Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal and Rooiberg Game Reserve in Limpopo Province have been identified for translocation (five male, four female).

According to South African experts, seven of the twelve cheetahs have been in quarantine for more than seven months, which may affect their reintroduction chances.

“The seven-month quarantine period could have a negative impact on the likelihood of a successful reintroduction, as the cheetahs would have lost considerable fitness, condition, and vigilance during this time,” said the unnamed expert. According to the expert, the other five cheetahs are healthy because they were recaptured in December 2023.

“The reproductive ability of the females would have been compromised, as fertility is diminished if females do not begin reproducing until later in life or if they go for long periods without reproducing. This has the potential to hinder their establishment in Kuno, according to cheetah metapopulation project leader Vincent Van der Merwe.

However, he added, “They are born in the wild and know what to do. They will gradually regain fitness and health, but it would have been preferable if they had only spent two months in boma…”

According to Indian officials, the cheetahs have undergone extensive health examinations and are fit for relocation.

“The extended period of captivity will have no effect on the cheetahs. The Namibian cheetahs were also in captivity, but after being released into a 6-square-kilometer predator-free boma, they now hunt properly and satisfy their hunger by killing herbivores that were completely new to them, according to SP Yadav, member secretary of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA).

Upon arrival, the cheetahs will be quarantined for a month while their health is closely monitored, he added.

“Our objective is to establish a sustainable and viable meta population of approximately 40 individuals in India. “Project Cheetah will be deemed a success when we have a viable population of forty cheetahs and successful breeding every year,” said Yadav.

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Yadav said of the eight Namibian cheetahs living in Kuno, “They are marking or scratching on trees, and you can see them in groups, which indicates they are forming coalitions. They also hunt every 3 to 4 days…”

The post Tomorrow, 12 cheetahs from South Africa will arrive in India. appeared first on Republic Aeon.