India: Officials at Kuno national park struggle to trace cheetah after radio collar stops working

Madhya Pradesh wildlife officials, along with Namibian experts, are struggling to track two female cheetahs, Nirva and Dhatri, at Kuno National Park as the radio collar of one of the cheetahs has gonesilent due to a technical glitch.

Now, they are being forced to use various traditional methods such as parading on elephants, deploying ground teams and CCTVs, and seeking assistance from local villagers, to locate the cheetahs.

Unfortunately, Nirva has remained untraceable since its radio collar stopped working.

What's the purpose of the tracing exercise?

The aim of this tracking exercise is to bring the free-ranging cheetahs back to their enclosures so that their radio collars can be removed and the animals can be checked for possible infections caused by wet weather conditions.

This comes after the unfortunate deaths of two male cheetahs in July.

Earlier on July 25, Prabhas and Veera, two translocated cheetahs, were successfully brought back to the enclosure for health checkups and were found to be in good health.

Current status

Currently, there are 13 cheetahs, including seven males and six females, safely inside the enclosure. Despite some issues with the radio collars, the monitoring teams are continuously observing and tracking the cheetahs.

Earlier, two male cheetahs, Tejas and Suraj, died allegedly due to infections allegedly caused by their collars during extreme wet conditions. However, the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change has dismissed these reports as "unscientific."

Watch:India: One more cheetah dies at Kuno National Park

The park has experienced several other unfortunate incidents with cheetahs, including the deaths of six cheetahs, including three cubs, earlier. There have been injuries and fatalities due to skirmishes and health issues like renal failure and cardiac failure.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi introduced eight Namibian cheetahs to the Kuno National Park on September 17, 2022, and on February 18, 2023, 12 cheetahs were brought from South Africa to the park.

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