BHUBANESWAR: The upcoming tiger and elephant census will be carried out next year but not at the same time. The elephant census and All India Tiger Estimation (AITE) are usually held in different years but this time both the census will take place in the same year as per the new guidelines of the Centre, said Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF) Wildlife Shashi Paul on Thursday.
The tiger census is conducted once in four years, while elephant survey is carried out once in five years. The next AITE is scheduled to be held in 2022. The elephant census too will be held next year. The process for the next elephant census in the State will start in January 2022.
Apart from the survey to count elephant population by the Centre, Odisha used to conduct its own census every two years which could not be done in 2019 and was subsequently put on hold following the outbreak of Covid-19 in 2020.
Wildlife officials said the process for the four-phase big cat census has already started in Odisha and the training of the trainers was also completed this month in which the field directors of Similipal and Satkosia along with their teams visited Ranthambore to take part in the training session.
Soon, the two teams will impart training to the field-level officials and staff in the two tiger reserves as well as divisions within the tiger landscape to proceed further for the survey.
Odisha is planning to cover more areas in the AITE - 2022. The census which took place in around 15 forest divisions last year, will cover 20 divisions this year.
The census will include sign survey, pug mark count and camera traps. It will use a mobile application called Monitoring System for Tiger-Intensive Protection and Ecological Status (M-STrIPES) to make the survey error-free.
The AITE survey of 2018 had pegged Odisha’s tiger population at 28, while the 2017 elephant census had counted the presence of 1,976 jumbos in the State.