COIMBATORE: A total of 26 spotted deer, including five fawns, were relocated from the Coimbatore corporation zoo and released inside the forest at filter house in Siruvani hills on Monday morning.
Forest department officials started feeding the deer with fodder that was sourced from the surroundings of Siruvani hills since March and stopped providing concentrated feed. This was done for the welfare of the spotted deers to acclimatize the animals to the new food ahead of the relocation.
Coimbatore forest division officials started shifting the animals that are listed under the various category of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, following an order from Principal Chief Conservator of forest (PCCF) and Chief Wildlife Warden (CWLW) Srinivas R Reddy since the Coimbatore City Municipal Corporation-maintained zoo lacks approval from the central government for running it after January 2022 when it was closed to tourists.
“We collected faecal pellets of a few spotted deer in the zoo and sent them for analysis to the Advanced Institute for Wildlife Conservation (AIWC) at Vandalur, Chennai. We received a report that the spotted deer do not have tuberculosis infection. We carried out this test to ensure that the animals are free from TB since the infection can spread to other wild animals easily,” said the official.
A team led by Conservator of forests and field director of Anamalai Tiger Reserve (ATR) S Ramasubramaniam and DFO N Jayaraj along with range officers and Coimbatore forest veterinarian started loading the animals in specially designed vehicles from the zoo from 6am and released them at 9.20 am in Siruvani hills.
To load the spotted deer, a cage was set up inside the corporation-owned vehicle. Ten adult males, 11 adult females, two male fawns and three female fawns were shifted. “A team has been formed to monitor if the deer get water and consume fodder at the new place,” said the official.
Further, officials are training 20 Sambar deer in the zoo by placing in a vehicle fodder collected from the Siruvani hills. “The spotted deer were trained like this for over a month, because of which they entered the vehicle easily,” said the official. A few varieties of birds and reptiles were shifted to the Arignar Anna Zoological Park at Vandalur in Chennai, and Amirthi Zoological Park in Vellore district in November 2023.