The Hindu : National : Six hog deer fleeing Kaziranga park run over on highway

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Six hog deer fleeing Kaziranga park run over on highway

Special Correspondent

Animals continue to cross highway to the Karbi Anglong hills

Guwahati: Six hog deer of the Kaziranga National Park (KNP) have been run over by vehicles on the National Highway 37. The herds have been fleeing the park and crossing the highway for shelter on highlands over the past three days in the wake of floods.

So far, two rhino calves have also died — one drowned in floods and the other eaten by a tiger as it was moving towards the highlands.

KNP Director S.N. Buragohain told The Hindu on Friday that five rhinos had come out of the park and were moving to the highland on the Karbi Anglong hills.

“We are worried about their safety. Forest officials in Karbi Anglong have been alerted and they have deployed 26 forest guards along the area to protect the rhinos from poachers,” he said.

Mr. Buragohain said two large herds of elephants and a large number of deer and other animals have crossed the highway towards Karbi Anglong. Forest guards have rescued a number of hog deer from drowning. They were being treated at the park’s animal rescue centre.

Flood waters of the Brahmaputra submerged the park’s road network.

The KNP director said 69 watch camps were affected and the frontline staff of one of them had to be shifted to a safer location. Although the water level has stopped rising, about 60 per cent of the park area was still under water.

The highest recorded flooding occurred in the national park was in 1988 when 70 per cent of the park was submerged, causing the death of at least 38 rhinoceros — including 23 calves — 1,050 deer, 69 wild boar, three baby elephants, two tigers and a large number animals belonging to the smaller species. Forty-four rhinoceros were killed in the floods in 1998. Seventy-four animals were killed in 2004.

A World Heritage Site, the Kaziranga National Park shelters about 15 species of India’s threatened mammals, including one-horned rhinoceros, wild buffaloes, Indian elephants and Royal Bengal tigers.

The park has the world’s largest population of one-horned rhinoceros.

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