The second synchronised elephant population estimation began on Thursday in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh.
In Tamil Nadu, it is being conducted in 26 forest divisions and 697 blocks. Teams of forest guards, forest watchers, and volunteers walked in the selected blocks from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. and recorded the presence of elephants and their details.
Across the State, 1,836 Forest Department staff members and 342 volunteers will participate in the exercise.
Formal training for the estimation was given from May 12 to May 22 with biologists working at the Mudumalai, Sathyamangalam, Anamalai, Srivilliputhur-Megamalai, and Kalakkad-Mundanthurai Tiger Reserves, the Forest Department said.
On Friday, Forest Department staff members and volunteers will walk along the transect line set up over two kilometres and survey elephant dungs visible on both sides and record observations.
The waterhole survey will be undertaken on Saturday, the final day of the exercise, wherever there is a waterhole. The teams will record elephants coming for drinking water and note down the herd structure and sex of the animals.
In the Anamalai Tiger Reserve, 199 forest staff members and 30 volunteers are engaged in the estimation in 87 blocks in eight forest ranges under the Pollachi and Tiruppur Forest Divisions. Field Director S. Ramasubramanian was coordinating the exercise being conducted under the supervision of Deputy Field Directors Bhargava Teja and Devendra Kumar Meena.
District Forest Officer N. Jayaraj said 84 staff members and 40 trainees from the Central Academy for State Forest Service and volunteers from WWF-India are engaged in the estimation in 42 blocks under seven forest ranges in the Coimbatore Forest Division.
In the Nilgiris, the exercise began in the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve, the Mukurthi National Park, Masinagudi, and the Gudalur and Nilgiris Forest Divisions. D. Venkatesh, Conservator of Forests (Nilgiris), said the exercise would be conducted across 105 blocks by 338 volunteers and staff members.
After the estimation is done, the District Forest Officers will send the data forms, filled with collected details, to the Tiger Monitoring Cell, Theppakadu, Mudumalai Tiger Reserve. The data will be systematically analysed and the number of elephants in the 26 forest divisions will be estimated for all elephant and tiger reserves.
According to the Tamil Nadu Forest Department, for the first time, a synthesis report of the southern States will be prepared to give better insights into the population patterns in the neighbouring States.
Last year, 2,961 elephants were recorded in Tamil Nadu.
