Uttarakhand’s tiger count has gone from 163 to 242 in a year
While 63 additional tigers were discovered in the Corbett and Rajaji reserves, another 11 cubs were born in the same time period.
Uttarakhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat on Thursday said the count of adult tigers in the state had risen to 242 from 197 over the past year. Forest officials found 63 tigers living in the Jim Corbett National Park and the Rajaji Tiger Reserve that had previously not been counted. Another 11 cubs were born in the two reserves in the same period, he said.
The Corbett reserve now has 208 adult tigers, as against 163 in 2015-16, and six cubs. The Rajaji reserve has 34 tigers, up from 16 in 2015-16, and five cubs.
This means Uttarakhand has the country’s second-highest ratio of tigers to area, Rawat said. Karnataka has the highest, with a population of 400 tigers. While releasing the figures for 2016-17, Rawat congratulated the Forest Department for its conservation work.
Forest Department officials said the tiger count had increased in the reserves because of the heightened security measures they had taken up, The Times of India reported.
