Orus Ilyas
Aligarh Muslim University, India
Title: Population dynamics and activity budget of chital in highlands of Central India: A case study of Pench Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh (India)
Biography
Biography: Orus Ilyas
Abstract
Understanding activity pattern of wild animal is a very important aspect of behavior as it affects conservation planning. Considering this, present study was conducted on chital (Axis axis) in Pench Tiger Reserve to record abundance, group composition and day time activity pattern during 2015. Pench Tiger Reserve is 19th Tiger reserve of India, situated in Seoni and Chhindwara district of Madhya Pradesh, India (21°41′35″N 79°14′54″E). For the purpose, distance sampling and scan sampling methods were applied. The results revealed that density of chital was 79.1± 9.6 ind/km2 that projected a total biomass of 3714 kg/km2. The study also suggested that chital groups were composed of 43% of adult females followed by adult male (22%), sub-adult female (8%), sub-adult male (6%) and yearling (21%). Sex ratio revealed that one male was available for two females depicting sex ratio of 1:2. Activity pattern were recorded at two hours’ time slot from morning 6 AM till evening 16 hrs. During this period, the data were recorded on different activities such as resting, standing, feeding, drinking, etc. The results shows the proportion of activities of whole day, that the animals spend more time on feeding, about 40-50%, for foraging they move about 10-15% in whole day, about 20-25% of time spent for resting. Resting activity is mainly performed for the purpose ruminating. They spend about 10% time for standing which includes vigilance or scanning for anything suspicious. Feeding data were also recorded and chital was seen utilizing 11 species of tree, 2 species of shrub, 5 species of herb and 9 species of grasses. Efforts were made to construct the life table on the data collected on the population structure of chital to predict the life expectancy for chital and to investigate mortality rate at a particular age interval, though the data was not enough to predict the population trend, but still efforts were made. The results show that the maximum life expectancy was recorded at the age of sub adult, while maximum mortality rate was recorded at the adult stage followed by yearling.