The park has already written to principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife) Shree Bhagwan, seeking the two tigresses not only to increase the captive tiger population at the park, but also address the major concern of in-breeding among the present lot, which could lead to a weaker race of the animal.
Officials from the Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP), who are busy scouting for new tigers, have their eyes set on the two hand-reared captive tigresses from Pench National Park, which were supposed to be released in the wild but haven't been, with experts too advising against doing it for the time being.
The park has already written to principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife) Shree Bhagwan, seeking the two tigresses not only to increase the captive tiger population at the park, but also address the major concern of in-breeding among the present lot, which could lead to a weaker race of the animal.
Chief conservator of forest and field director of SGNP Vikas Gupta said, "We need new tigers as we are in the process of a major makeover of the lion and tiger safari. Also, because we want to avoid inbreeding and age too is a big criteria, it would be in the best interests of the park that we got new tigers."
One of the biggest reasons to write seeking the hand-reared tigresses from Pench was that being within the state the time taken for acquiring the cats would be far less, he added.
Sources in the forest department said there were three tigers — two female and one male — that were hand-reared in a barricaded enclosure at Pench; the male tiger was given to Pune zoo in 2014 after being termed not fit for release into the wild, which makes the demand for the two females by SGNP valid as even Wildlife Institute of India officials suggested that the two females were not fit for release into the wild.
Park officials said they were also concerned about lions as the park had just three. Gupta said they were scouting for lions. "We have initiated the work and asked staff to gather information if any place is ready to offer lions or tigers as acquiring new animals, specially the big cats, takes a lot of time and correspondence," he added.
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