A city-based wildlife photographer has spotted a ‘white’ spotted deer in Karnataka’s Kabani Wildlife Sanctuary, one of the popular wildlife destination in South India.
Suresh V. Kurup, who hails from Kudapanakunnnu in the State capital, photographed the white spotted deer near the tourist zone of the park that leads to the lake on May 5.
The popular wildlife destinations is a favourite of nature lovers and wildlife photographers.
Mr. Kurup spotted the deer during a routine visit to the park from where much of the large cat photos of south India are photographed.
“I chanced upon the deer 30 metres away on Friday evening and soon it vanished into the thick forest,” says Mr. Kurup, a keen wildlife enthusiast.
Though albinism has been reported in spotted deer from the country earlier, Sujith V. Gopalan, Project Associate, Kerala State Biodiversity Board, says it’s for the first time that a partial pigmented spotted deer has been reported from India. “The phenomenon of partial pigmentation in animals is Leucism. Hence this would be the first record of a leucistic spotted deer from India,” he points out.
Chital or Spotted Deer (Axis axis) is one of the most common, widespread species of deer found in India. The coat colour of the species is known to range from golden to reddish. The coat colour of the mammals are known to change to a certain extent in relation to environmental and ecological conditions, he says.
Coat colour
Further age, sex, nutrition and health status is also reflected in coat colour. Wide ranges of colour variations are known to occur in the case of genetic colour aberrations such as albinism and melanism.
Albinism is characterized by the absence of melanin pigment resulting in total white body with pink limbs, snout, ears and red eyes. Whereas in melanism, there is a presence of excess amount of melanin pigment, which results in dark or black coat colour.
Morphologically the striking difference between albinism and Leucism is the eye colour.
Those affected by albinism typically have red eyes due to the underlying blood vessels showing through.
In contrast, most leucistic animals have normally coloured eyes.
Albinism is caused by genetic colour aberrations while leucism is caused by defects in pigment cell differentiation and/or migration from the site, says the Project Associate who analysed the photograph taken by Mr. Kurup.
Wide range of colour variations, mammals in particular has always evoked curiosity, the most common being the White tiger which is a typical example for a leucistic animal. The layman considers these animals as distinct species, because of their striking difference with their original form.
Though melanism is less frequent in animals, he says a perfect example to sight would be the Black Panther.
