Finally, the state government is all set to declare an ecologically ‘complete’ and sensitive wild habitat in Sathyamangalam forest division as a sanctuary. Once a refuge for Veerappan, the forest range will now be a sanctuary for wildlife.
State forest minister N Selvaraj signed the file this week paving the way for the forest department to notify about 500 sq.km of open jungle with the Moyar river acting as the bridge between the western and eastern ghats. It will be named as Sujal Kuttai blackbuck sanctuary. In the last wildlife census, it was found that there were
about 2,000 blackbuck.
“The sanctuary is the key to genetic flow between the western and eastern ghats,’’ says a forest officer. The open jungle and the riverine ecosystem facilitates the movement of large mammals like elephants from Mudumalai wildlife sanctuary and Nilgiris North Division to the Eastern Ghats along the Moyar river.
Recent studies have revealed that there are about 10 tigers in Sathyamangalam forest division covering 1450 sq.km, including the new sanctuary. “The sanctuary will be a great boon to conservation as it will be contiguous with Mudumalai, Wayanad, Bandipur and Nagarhole sanctuaries and national parks, making it one of the largest wildlife habitats in the country,’’ says K Kalidasan, a Coimbatore-based environmentalist.
The Sujal Kuttai sanctuary, including the scenic Thengumarahada, has been found to be the only home for vultures in the state. In a census, about 150 vultures were found in the habitat. The latest to be sighted were long-billed and whitebacked vultures, said a forester in the new sanctuary, defining it as a complete ecosystem with the prey, predators and scavengers (hyenas) co-existing.
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