Journal of
Threatened Taxa | www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 November 2018 | 10(13):
12833–12836
First photographic record of tiger presence at higher elevations of the
Mishmi Hills in the Eastern Himalayan Biodiversity Hotspot, Arunachal Pradesh,
India
Aisho Sharma Adhikarimayum
1 & G.V. Gopi 2
1,2 Department of Endangered Species
Management, Wildlife Institute of India, P.O. Box # 18, Chandrabani,
Dehradun, Uttarakhand 248001, India
1 aishosharma85@gmail.com, 2 gopigv@wii.gov.in
(corresponding author)
doi: https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.4381.10.13.12833-12836
| ZooBank: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:36A523A9-BF76-461B-B777-1597C7EC8EF1
Editor: L.A.K.
Singh, Bhubaneswar, Odisha,
India. Date
of publication: 26 November 2018 (online & print)
Manuscript details: Ms
# 4381 | Received 02 July 2018 | Final received 15 October 2018 | Finally
accepted 01 November 2018
Citation: Adhikarimayum, A.S. & G.V. Gopi (2018). First
photographic record of tiger presence at higher elevations of the Mishmi Hills
in the Eastern Himalayan Biodiversity Hotspot, Arunachal Pradesh, India. Journal
of Threatened Taxa 10(13): 12833-12836; https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.4381.10.13.12833-12836
Copyright: © Adhikarimayum & Gopi 2018. Creative Commons
Attribution 4.0 International License. JoTT
allows unrestricted use of this article in any medium, reproduction and
distribution by providing adequate credit to the authors and the source of
publication.
Funding: National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA),
New Delhi.
Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
Acknowledgements: We would like to
thank Department of Environment and Forest, Arunachal Pradesh for providing the
necessary permits and the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) for the
funding support. We would also like to thank local Idu
Mishmi villagers, our field assistants, friends and colleagues Dr. Taibang Watham
and Mr. Deepan for their
enormous support, during field works. We are also thankful to Dr. V.B. Mathur (Director), Dr. G.S. Rawat (Dean) and Dr. Bitapi. C. Sinha (Research Coordinator), Wildlife Institute of India,
Dehradun for their support and encouragement.
The
Tiger Panthera tigris is a large and wide-ranging cat that
occupies a variety of habitats, where it generally serves as the top
predator. The tiger is also a flagship
species (Dinerstein et al. 2007), and
attention to protecting tiger populations and their habitats in Asian eco-regions
has increased over the past few decades.
India harbors more than 70% of the total
global wild tiger population in five major areas containing habitats ranging
from dry to moist deciduous forest, evergreen to mangrove forests, and Terai grasslands to mixed conifer-broadleaf forests (Jhala et al. 2015). Literature suggests that the ranges of the
Royal Bengal Tiger Panthera tigris tigris
and the Northern Indochinese Tiger Panthera
tigris corbetti may
overlap in northeast India and Myanmar (Luo
et al. 2004). Limited ecological
information exists on tiger ecology from the temperate forests of the Eastern
Himalayan Biodiversity Hotspot (Jhala et
al. 2011), which is located at the confluence of the Palearctic and Indo-China
realms (Chatterjee et al. 2006). Biological surveys in the region,
particularly in Arunachal Pradesh, have been hampered by the rugged and largely
inaccessible landscape. Thus faunal
diversity has remained poorly surveyed, and large areas remain unstudied.
Study
Area: The Dibang Wildlife Sanctuary (DWS) (95°17′–96°
38′E and 28°38′–29°27′ N latitudes) located in the Dibang
Valley District of Arunachal Pradesh, India covers an area of 4,149km2.
It partially falls within the Dihang-Dibang Biosphere Reserve, and mostly extends over the
Mishmi Hills. The northern and eastern
parts of DWS are surrounded by China.
The altitude ranges from 1,800–5,000 m, and the area receives an annual
rainfall of 2,500mm from occasional rains and the southeast and northeast
monsoons. The vegetation is broadly
classified as temperate broad-leaved forest dominated by Michelis
spp., Quercus spp., Coptis
teeta and Magnolia spp., temperate
conifer forest dominated by Rhododendron arboretum, Taxus
baccata & Pinus wallichiana, and alpine forest dominated by Saussurea spp., Sedum spp. &
Saxifraga spp.
Camera
trapping: A three-year long study was recently carried out in the Dibang Wildlife Sanctuary and the Mishmi Hill range to
strengthen the ecological baseline information on tiger, co-predators and prey
ecology. As a part of this study, camera
traps were laid to monitor wildlife in and outside DWS. To cover maximum area of DWS and its
adjoining landscapes, a single-sided camera trap was deployed for every 3km2
grid for three years (2015–2017). A
total of 108 camera traps were deployed in 336km2 with 13,761 trap
nights inside and outside the protected area.
A total
of 42 left sided photographs (Image 1) of tigers were recorded. With further image processing we were able to
identify 11 unique individual tigers including two cubs. Two male tigers were captured in the Mishmi
Hills at 3,246m on 29 May 2017 (Image 2a) and 14 January 2017 (Image 2b). One of the males (Image 2b) was recaptured at
3,630m on 07 June 2017 (Image 2c) in an area with different vegetation type:
the higher elevation is sub-alpine forest comprising mainly of Abies densa and
dwarf Rhododendron spp.
While the lower elevation has mixed vegetation dominated by Rhododendron
arboreum, Bamboo and Pine.
Our
study provides photographic evidence for the presence of tiger in the Eastern
Himalaya at 3,630m, within the biodiversity hotspot. Tiger tracks have been reported in winter
snow in Indian
Himalaya at 3,050m (Prater 1980), and
pugmarks were reported from Temengor Forest Reserve,
Malaysia at 1,700–1,945 m (Mohamad et al. 2013). In Bhutan, Jigme & Tharchen
(2012) found photographic evidence of tigers up to an altitude of 4,200m. This information and our findings indicate
that tigers may utilize high altitude habitats close to the tree line, where
shrubs and grasses dominate and provide cover for prey and predators alike.
Captain
F.M. Bailey of the Indian Army mentioned the occurrence of tigers in the high
altitude forests of the Mishmi Hills (Bailey 1912). Aiyadurai (2007,
2014) provided information from the Idu Mishmi tribe
that suggested the presence of tigers in Dibang. In December 2012, two tiger cubs were rescued
from Angrim Valley of Anini
Tehsil, located at 1968m in Dibang Wildlife Sanctuary
(CMS ENVIS 2012). Thereafter, a preliminary rapid survey was carried out by the Wildlife
Institute of India (WII) in collaboration with National Tiger Conservation
Authority (NTCA) and Department of Environment and Forests, Arunachal Pradesh. The survey report (Gopi
et al. 2014) mentions about the image of an adult tiger captured at an altitude
of 1,765m at the Chelo Pani
camp (page 12 and 18), and pugmark and scat evidence of Tiger at 2,065m in the Ange Pani area (pages 15 and 18). The team concluded that Dibang
Wildlife Sanctuary holds the highest range for the tigers in India.
The all
India tiger population estimation in 2006, which used camera traps for the
first time, estimated a population of 84–118 tigers in the North Eastern Hills
and Brahmaputra plains. The number
increased to 118–178 in the 2010 estimate, and Jhala
et al. (2011) suggested that these numbers are likely underestimates since the
surveys did not systematically cover the entire landscape. In 2014, 201 tigers were reported for the North
Eastern Hills and Brahmaputra plains.
From Arunachal Pradesh 18 individual tigers were identified, and genetic
analysis of scats indicated that five Tigers were from Dibang
DWS (Jhala et al. 2015). After the launch of Project Tiger in 1973,
monitoring systems evolved from traditional methods using pugmarks until camera
trapping was introduced in 2006. Project
Tiger highlights the conservation issues in a wide array of habitats in India. Knowledge of tiger ecology at higher elevations
of the Himalayan region is currently inadequate, but is expected to improve in
the future.
The Global Tiger Recovery Plan was initiated in 2010 by the 13 tiger
range countries to double the number of wild tigers by 2022, popularly known as
“TX2”. Confirmed tiger presence
in high altitude montane habitats in the Himalaya
presents opportunities and challenges for the conservation of tigers and their
habitats. The Mishmi Hill ranges are now
documented to have more tigers than other designated tiger reserves in
Arunachal Pradesh, including Pakke (9 Tigers), Namdapha (4 Tigers from scat genetic analysis) and Kamlang (not assessed) (Jhala et al. 2015). The
immediate priority must be to ensure that the newly-discovered
populations are protected and monitored to identify potential genetic
uniqueness. Other promising areas should
also be surveyed to identify possible tiger presence. There is an urgent need for monitoring the
tiger metapopulation in the northeastern
hills range by assessing the functionality of corridors connecting local
populations.
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