Photographs by Forest Department staff of Pakke Tiger Reserve.
Intensive camera trapping by state forest departments (as per Phase-IV of NTCA) to monitor tiger populations, is now being done on a yearly basis in tiger reserves across India. This was done for the first time in Pakke Tiger Reserve in Arunachal Pradesh. Here are some stunning images of fabulous mammals captured during this season’s monitoring exercise. This effort has been mainly undertaken by the forest department staff of Pakke (with WWF-India doing a few blocks).
A ‘Best Camera Trap Image Contest’ was organised in Pakke to raise staff morale. The images in the photo feature indicate that the efforts of the staff have paid off! Unhappily, in addition to cameras damaged by elephants, six camera-traps were stolen. As part of the contest, three winners were selected (binoculars and certificates were given) for their camera trap images.
The winning photographs were:
- ‘A deadly tiger photograph’ by K. Tayem
- ‘Two marbled cats caught on marvellously placed camera traps’ by Raham Langlang
- ‘A wild pig in Pakke’s wilderness’ by Marka Tachang (not in photo feature)
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Melanism is more frequent in dense tropical forests compared to open forests. A melanistic leopard on M. Doimari's camera.
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There are 13 photographs of the elusive clouded leopard from this year's Phase-IV tiger estimation. Here is one photograph from a camera trap placed by Raham Langlang.
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Of the 59 documented mammal species in PTR, the golden cat is one such interesting one. (Photograph by WWF-India). This one is a dark morph.
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This image by M. Doimari of an elephant with her calf along with many others indicates that the reserve is one of the last refuges of elephants in north-east India
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Forest guard K. Tayem’s stunning image of a tiger growling ferociously while looking straight at the camera! (Winner of the best-camera trapping image contest).
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A pair of marbled cats passed the same camera trap in which a clouded leopard was spotted. Photograph by Raham Langlang (Winner of the best-camera trapping image contest).
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Of the 115 leopard photographs, there was only one with a melanistic and normally patterned leopard together. Photograph by Sajna Tachang.
About the author
Nandini Velho
Nandini is a postgraduate in wildlife biology and conservation. She is currently a PhD student at James Cook University and research associate at National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS).
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Intensive camera trapping was done for the first time in Pakke Tiger Reserve in Arunachal Pradesh (as per Phase-IV of NTCA) to monitor tiger populations.