Leopard gets a chip implant for tracking

Jodhpur: In a first in the district, a microchip was implanted in a

leopard

at Jodhpur’s Machiya Safari Park on Sunday. The leopard was caught by the

forest department

recently following a three-day long operation from a paddy field in Ghanamagra, a village in Bilara near Jodhpur.

This is the first case of a leopard being implanted with a microchip in Jodhpur. Before this case, three leopards were implanted with chips in Jaipur. These too had strayed into human habitat. Of these, two had strayed from Sariska.

According to veterinarian Arvind Mathur, such microchips have been implanted in elephants and wolves earlier. Now, with a spurt in incidents of such wild cats straying into human habitats, it was decided to implant chips in them also.

“If the same panther strays again into human habitat, the chip would let us identify him and help us take the decision on what to do accordingly,” said Mathur, adding that the chip would remain functional till death.

Another veterinarian Shravan Singh Rathore said that this was the best way of monitoring such animals, which stray into human spaces and trigger panic.

He said that the adoption of this technology was required as there has been a steady increase in such incidents in Rajasthan and cases of animal-human conflicts have also been rising in the recent past.

“It has become common these days. A growing numbers of these animals have been making their way into human settlements for food and attack cattle and even human beings,” Rathore said.

As for Jodhpur, this was the fifth such intrusion of leopards that was reported over the past few years. The animals had travelled long distances from their natural habitats.

Rathore said that this leopard, which may have come from Aravali ranges near Bar-Sendra-Tadgarh area in search of food, killed two dogs in Ghanamagra village, where he remained hidden for three days before being caught.

This is six- to seven-year-old adult male leopard was taken to Machiya Safari Park. The forest department will monitor its condition for the next few days and free it in its natural habitat.