Activists and members of the Save Ennore Creek Campaign have urged the State government to extend the Eco Sensitive Zone of the Pulicat lake and sanctuary to cover all areas of conservation importance within the Ennore-Pulicat wetlands complex.
Naturalists and local residents, who spotted nests with baby pelicans atop pilon towers, have made this urgent appeal to save the sanctuary that is home to thousands of migratory birds every year.
M. Yuvan, a naturalist, said that on February 17 when they went to the spot, they saw painted storks, green shanks, garganey ducks on the streams and in salt marshlands near the Kamarajar Port. "The previous government had reduced the eco sensitive zone to just 500m from the boundary of the sanctuary, without any study on the habitat. These birds that we found were much beyond that boundary and several come back to the same spot to nest," he added.
Activist Nityanand Jayaraman said they also documented large flocks of open-billed storks, pacific golden plovers, pelicans, black-headed ibis, Little Temminck’s stint in the mosaic of habitats including mudflats, ponds, streams, backwaters and thorny shrubs within the Eco Sensitive Zone (ESZ) of the Pulicat sanctuary.
In a letter sent to the Chief Wildlife Warden, the team complained that contractors operating labour camps housing workers from the ports were recklessly dumping garbage and discharging untreated sewage into the wetlands inside the ESZ. Several thousand workers are housed in unhygienic and unapproved labour camps constructed on the ecosensitive sand dunes with no proper sewage facilities.
