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An Ecological Move

Will the translocating of 10 rhinos prove to be a solution for the rapid growth of rhino population in Chitwan?

By A CORRESPONDENT

Some 10 rhinos belonging to the Royal Chitwan National Park (RCNP) in the last one week saw a new home -- The Royal Bardiya National Park (RBNP). The Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation translocated the prime attraction of the RCNP to a new habitat.

Rhinos at Chitawan : Change of Habitat

"This initiative has been taken in a bid to provide a second home for the one horned rhinos to protect it from the natural and other disasters and also to minimize the incidence of human-rhino interactions in the RCNP," explained the Department.

Between 1986 and 1999, the department had already translocated more than 40 rhinos from the RCNP. More than 50 rhinos roam the Royal Bardiya National Park today.

There were times in the early 60's when rhinos were on the verge on extinction. A concentrated effort both on the part of the government and donor agencies like World Wildlife Fund for Nature resulted into the successful conservation of the once endangered species.

Today the protected species are found around 400 in number at the RCNP. So much so, time has come for them to be translocated. What happened? Along with the growth in the number of rhinos came other problems like ecological disturbance and increasing confrontation with humans in the buffer zone.

"Due to the natural succession of Khair, Sisso, Simal, and other trees, only few pockets of Rhinos' habitat remain at the RCNP," say DNPWC officials. "As a result, high population densities of the rhino have been found in the border areas of the park that has high diversities of habitat types."

Since the one-horned rhinos have begun to concentrate themselves in the border areas, locals in the bufer zone of the national park have begun to face the growing terrorism of the rhino gang frequently visiting their paddy-fields and destroying the cash-crops. "That no doubt has left the villagers vexed," says Ranger Besindra Raj Subedi a Ranger at RCNP. "This menace is seriously on the rise."

As the number of wild animals in the conservation areas and the human population in the buffer zone -- the bordering human-settlement area that surrounds the national parks -- shoot up, conflict between the two inhabitants in the same area has become the rule of the day.

With their number rapidly growing, wild animals, naturally take strolls outside their park territories, while the increase in the human population leads to growing pressure to enter the national parks -- by hook or by crook.

And, the trans-boundary "trespassing" by both the sides triggers the clash between park and the people. Even during their brief stint with human civilization in the buffer zone, "visitors" from the jungle leave behind the imprints of wilderness -- destroying crops, injuring locals and sometimes even killing them.

A draft field-study report of Royal Bardiya National Park (RBNP) prepared for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) gives a clear picture. "Wildlife damage is occurring in 94 villages which is one third of the total villages in 16 Park-bordering Village Developing Committees (VDCs)," says the report presented in October last year.

Quoting the Operation Plan Report 1996, the report further adds: Tigers, Rhinos and wild elephants killed 11 people and injured eight in 1995. In 1991, 23 livestock were killed in Thakurdwara Village Development Committee in the immediate vicinity of RBNP. Similarly, 131 livestock were killed from five VDCs in 1992. Worse, none of the locals received any compensation for their lost properties.

What is true with the RBNP, is also true with the RCNP. When the park was established in the early 70's, policy makers had the plan of increasing the number of one-horned rhinos from not even 50 to 500.

Today, the number of the prime attraction of the national park --the Asiatic Rhino -- has exceeded the target. Apart from the ecological disturbances and the confrontation with humans, rhinos fight and kill one another due to their depleting habitat.

Hence, the idea of translocation. But the million dollar question is: For how long will the idea of translocating work.