KOCHI: Amidst the increasing man-animal conflict which has led to widespread protests in the high ranges, a statewide enumeration conducted by the forest department revealed that the wild elephant population has declined by 58.19% in Kerala over the past five years.
As per the enumeration conducted in 2017, Kerala had 5,706 wild elephants, but the population declined to 2,386 in 2023.
Meanwhile, an enumeration of the tiger population in Wayanad wildlife sanctuary revealed that the population has come down to 84 from 120 in 2018.
Revealing the figures at a press meet in Thiruvananthapuram, forest minister A K Saseendran said the reason for the drastic decline in elephant population could be migration to Karnataka forests.
The enumeration was conducted across all south Indian states from May 17 to 19, 2023. The elephant census was conducted during the same period in 2017.
According to authorities, climate plays a significant role in elephant migration. During the 2017 enumeration, elephants migrated to Kerala as dry weather prevailed in Karnataka. This time, it was raining in Karnataka and the temperature was high in Kerala.
"The elephant enumeration was conducted adopting the block count and dung count method. In block count, the state forests were divided into 610 sample blocks with an average area of 5.78 sq km. In block count 1,920 elephants were counted and the population density was 0.20 per sq km. The total forest area with elephant population is 9,622.33 sq km of which 36.46% has been surveyed," the minister said.
As part of the dung count 2,386 elephants were counted and the population density was 0.25 per sq km. During the 2017 enumeration, 3,322 wild elephants were sighted in block count while 5,706 elephants were estimated in dung count.
As many as 251 elephant herds were located during the block count and 700 wild elephants were part of these herds. As part of the tiger enumeration 297 camera traps were installed in the Wayanad sanctuary, Aralam and Kottiyoor forests.
From the 297 images, 84 tigers were collected from 160 locations. Of the 84 tigers, 69 were in the Wayanad sanctuary while 8 were in the North Wayanad division and 7 were in the South Wayanad division.
Of the 84 tigers 45 (54%) were enumerated in 2016, 2018 and 2022 and 39 tigers (46%) were sighted for the first time. The analysis identified 29 male tigers and 47 females. The gender of the 8 tigers could not be confirmed. The density of tigers in Wayanad landscape is 7.7 per 100 sq km, which is healthy, said Minister Saseendran.