The Bhagabatpur Crocodile Project started in the mid 1970’s, was aimed at increasing the number of salt-water crocodiles, a Schedule-I species under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972.
A few years later, the eggs to hatchling ratio declined, and of the 100 eggs collected on an average — less than 40 would hatch, posing questions over the fate of the project.
“I was going through the data over the past few years and noticed the decrease in eggs to hatchling ratio. It is then we felt the need to involve experts to assist us,” Lipika Roy, Divisional Forest Officer, South 24 Parganas told The Hindu .
The State Forest Department involved experts like Shailendra Singh from Turtle Survival Alliance, Lonnie McCaskill from the Disney Animal Kingdom and Anirban Chaudhuri, wildlife consultant, Herpetology from Kolkata-based Nature Mates-Nature Club.
“The crocodile project located at Bhagbatpur is next to the uninhabited Lothian Island, far from the mainland in the Sunderbans archipelago. The place does not have electricity and it was particularly difficult to create an ideal situation and use modern techniques to improve hatching of crocodile eggs there,” Mr Chaudhuri told The Hindu .
The experts provided inputs to forest officials on how to collect crocodile eggs, to distinguish between fertile and infertile eggs, to create the ideal hatching environment using mother nest substrate and artificial substrate. The training, which also included on field training, started in December 2013 and continued for a year.
“The eggs to hatching ratio has vastly improved and it is now over 70. In the last one year, we have released nearly 75 sub-adult crocodiles in the Sunderbans,” Ms Roy said.
Pointing out that salt-water crocodiles are facing habitat loss, habitat shrinkage and over-exploitation of their prey base, mainly fish, Mr Chaudhuri said that the temperature during hatching of eggs is crucial for the male- female ratio of crocodiles. Since global warming is resulting in increase of temperature, maintaining the sex ratio of crocodiles is a challenge for us, he added.
At least 50 crocodiles, which were released in the wild recently, have been tagged to keep a check on their condition in the wild.
Experts believe that the project needs to be sustained and more research is required as it is one of the few such unique crocodile breeding projects in India.
The project is aimed at increasing the number of salt-water crocodiles
Source - The Hindu
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