Sighting
of Tibetan Wolf Canislupus chanko in the Greater Himalayan
range of Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve, Uttarakhand,
India: a new record
T. Bhattacharya 1& S. Sathyakumar 2
1,2 Wildlife Institute of India, P.O.
Box 18, Chandrabani, Dehradun,Uttarakhand 248001, India
Email: 2 ssk@wii.gov.in
Date of publication (online): 26 November 2010
Date of publication (print): 26 November 2010
ISSN 0974-7907 (online) | 0974-7893 (print)
Editor: Michael J.B. Green
Manuscript details:
Ms
# o2423
Received
11 March 2010
Final
received 09 September 2010
Finally
accepted 27 October 2010
Citation: Bhattacharya, T. & S. Sathyakumar(2010). Sighting of Tibetan Wolf Canis lupus chanko in the Greater Himalayan range of
Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve, Uttarakhand, India: a
new record. Journal
of Threatened Taxa 2(12): 1345-1348.
Copyright: © T. Bhattacharya & S. Sathyakumar 2010. Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. JoTTallows unrestricted use of this article in any medium for non-profit purposes,
reproduction and distribution by providing adequate credit to the authors and
the source of publication.
Acknowledgements: We are thankful to: the Ministry
of Environment and Forests, Government of India, for funding support; the Uttarakhand State Forest Department for granting
permission; and Director, and Dr. G.S. Rawat at the
Wildlife Institute of India for their encouragement and support.
The Tibetan Wolf is reported to
occur in the Trans-Himalayan regions of India (Fox et al. 1986; Chundawat 1992; Chundawat & Qureshi 1999). The Indian Trans-Himalaya is classified under BiogeographicZone 1 and is represented by Ladakh in Jammu &
Kashmir, Lahul & Spitiin Himachal Pradesh and northern Sikkim (Rodgers & Panwar1988). Very small portions of the
Trans-Himalaya are found in Uttarakhand, i.e., in
Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve (BR) and GangotriNational Park (NP). The presence
of Tibetan Wolf in Ladakh, Lahauland Spiti, and northern Sikkim, along with
information on livestock depredation has been well documented (Fox et al. 1986;
Fox et al. 1991; Chundawat 1992; Chundawat& Qureshi 1999; Jayapal2000; Sathyakumar & Qureshi2003). In India,
two subspecies of wolf are recognized by Sharma et al. (2004): Canislupus pallipes Indian Grey Wolf and C. l. chanko Tibetan Wolf. However, they are considered to be two
distinct species by Aggarwal et al. (2007), viz. the Indian Grey Wolf Canis indica and the Himalayan Wolf Canis himalayensis.
The Nanda Devi BR is an important
landscape in Uttarakhand that encompasses the Greater
and Trans Himalayan regions. Baseline information on the mammalian fauna of Nanda Devi NP and BR are
largely from surveys by several naturalists and biologists such as Dang (1961),Khacher (1983), Lamba(1987), Tak & Kumar (1987), Sathyakumar(1993 & 2004), and ZSI (1995). None of the aforementioned studies had indicated the presence of Tibetan
Wolf in Nanda Devi BR.
With this background, we report
sighting Tibetan Wolf at Bedini-Ali (79040’N
& 30012’E) located in the transition zone (Image 1) of Nanda
Devi BR while conducting field research on wildlife-habitat interactions at Bedini-Ali during 2005 and 2006 (Bhattacharya et al. 2006,
2009). The Bedini-Ali
area, located in the western region of Nanda Devi BR, falls within the Greater
Himalayan region and encompasses upper temperate, subalpine and alpine habitats
ranging from 3,000 to 5,000 m and a diversity of slopes and aspects due to the
mountainous topography. Vegetation
of Bedini-Ali includes: alpine meadows and scrub
above the tree limit, dominated by Rhododendron campanulatum, and subalpine forests dominated
by Brown Oak Quercus semecarpifolia and Silver Fir Abies pindrow. The average temperature of this area ranges between 180C
and -100C; total annual rainfall is over 2,000mm. Wan is the main village lying west of Bedini-Ali. The subalpine and alpine regions of Bedini-Ali
are subjected to high levels of livestock grazing, mainly goats and sheep (c.
5,000) during the summer months (Bhattacharya et al. 2006, 2009).
The first record of Tibetan Wolf
was a pair encountered in the vicinity of the deserted tourist hut at Bedini (3,700m) during late November 2005 after the first
snowfall in the area. These
animals were larger than the Red Fox Vulpes vulpes, the only other canidencountered in the study area, and had longer crests of black hair on their
back. Subsequently, one or two
individuals were recorded on one or more occasions on 16 days between December
2005 and May 2006 in the alpine meadows of Bedini-Ali
near the tree line (Image 2). In
September 2006, scats of Tibetan Wolf in Nanda Devi BR were recorded from
between Malari and Laptal(Trans-Himalaya), located in the eastern part of the BR (Images 1 &
3). Evidence of wolf was also
recorded at Dung (near Milam) and Rimkhim, located in
the eastern part of the BR in 2008 (Maheshwari &
Sharma 2010). Local villagers and
livestock herders confirmed the presence of wolf (locally called Bheriya) in the Bedini-Ali area
and also reported livestock depredation by wolf in the recent past. There were no reports of the presence
of feral dogs in this area. Livestock herders reported one instance of
livestock killed by wolf in Bedini-Ali during May
2006.
Two factors need to be addressed
while considering this sighting outside its known range. The first factor is obviously the
unusual sighting of the Tibetan Wolf (a Trans-Himalayan species) in the alpine
regions of Bedini-Ali, which represents moist
habitats close to tree line in the Greater Himalaya. The mammalian fauna of Nanda Devi NP and BR has been
reasonably well documented through several surveys since the early 1980s (Khacher 1983; Lamba 1987; Tak & Kumar 1987; ZSI 1995; Sathyakumar1993, 2004; Kandpal 2010;) and it is very unlikely
that a large carnivore such as the Tibetan Wolf would have remained
unrecorded. Moreover, with
substantial historical and current presence and movements of herders and their
livestock in the subalpine and alpine regions of Bedini-Ali,
at least secondary reports on the presence of this species should have been
reported earlier. However, the
absence of records of Tibetan Wolf during earlier scientific surveys, and lack
of past reports from local herders and villagers in Bedini-Ali
does not necessarily imply that the wolf did not occur in this area in the
historical past. The Tibetan Wolf
ranges over large areas and a few itinerant individuals may visit peripheral
parts of their natural distribution range very occasionally (Y.V. Bhatnagar pers. comm. 2010). Hence, it is likely that the wolf may not have been detected
in the past.
Therefore, we hypothesize that the
Tibetan Wolf would have probably moved from the Trans-Himalayan parts to the
Greater Himalayan parts of Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve. If this hypothesis is proved to be
right, then there is another interesting aspect to these observations. The Trans-Himalayan regions in Nanda
Devi are confined to the northern, north-eastern and
eastern parts of the BR. There are
no reports on the presence of Tibetan Wolf in the vicinity of Bedini-Ali and also from inside the Nanda Devi NP (Lamba 1987; Tak & Kumar 1987;Sathyakumar 1993, 2004). The rim of snow capped high peaks (> 6,000m) along the
boundary of Nanda Devi NP (Image 1) is presumed to be a barrier for the
movement of the Tibetan wolf through the NP and, therefore, it is likely that
the Tibetan Wolf inhabiting the Trans-Himalayan regions of Nanda Devi BR (Malari-Laptal) would have moved around the Nanda Devi NP in
the buffer zones along the alpine regions towards the west, following migratory
livestock herds that graze in these areas during summer (Image 1).
We recommend that field surveys be
carried out in Bedini-Ali, Pindari,
Milam, Ralam, Malari,
Lapthal, Rim Kim and similar habitats in the Nanda Devi BR, using camera traps
and use of non-invasive DNA sampling (from scats) to confirm the presence of
the Tibetan Wolf in these areas and delineate its distribution in Nanda Devi
BR. Simultaneously, thorough
surveys should be carried out in villages of transition zone to investigate the
extent of local knowledge about presence of wolf and their attitude towards wolf
presence. Such investigations will
be of great significance in enhancing our understanding of a possible range
extension of this species and has implications for conservation and management,
as wolf-human conflicts are a serious issue in other parts of the Indian
Trans-Himalaya.
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