BHUBANESWAR: The Nandankanan Zoological Park will bring animals and reptiles of four species including two female lions from the Kamla Nehru Prani Sangrahalaya in Indore as part of its animal exchange programme this year. The exchange programme with the Indore Zoo will be carried out to relocate the surplus animals in captivity and replenish depleting animal species in Nandankanan.
Nandankanan will also bring three gharials, three Indian wolves and one Indian fox. In return, it will give a white tiger, a melanistic tiger, three gharials, four golden pheasant and four silver pheasant to the Indore zoo.
The new arrivals this year will pave way for more such exchange programmes next year, Zoo authorities said. The officials are in talks with the Machhia Biological Park in Rajasthan for bringing in more wolves.
Earlier this year, the Zoo authorities had brought four male Asiatic lions and a pair of fox from Kanan Pendari Zoo of Bilaspur in Chhattisgarh under the exchange programme in which, the latter had decided to take a pair of hippopotamus.
Nandankanan authorities had also received nod to bring a pair of cheetah, wallabies and five zebras from abroad. The move, however, has not been executed due to outbreak of Covid-19, sources said.