Tiger cub rescued from Odisha village after 15-hour standoff near Similipal
A 7-8 month old tiger cub that wandered into Khaparkhai village near Similipal Tiger Reserve was rescued after 15 hours and will be rehabilitated before release.
A young tiger cub that strayed into a village adjoining the Similipal Tiger Reserve in Odisha's Mayurbhanj district was rescued by forest officials on Friday morning, ending a 15-hour period during which it moved between the forest and human habitation.
The cub, estimated to be seven to eight months old, first appeared near Khaparkhai village in the Thakurmunda Range of Karanjia Division around 7 pm on Thursday. It entered an abandoned cattle shed before retreating towards the forest. Villagers alerted the forest department, which deployed staff to monitor the animal through the night.
Around 1 pm, the cub was spotted moving towards the habitation again and entered an unoccupied house. Alert residents shut the door and locked it from outside to prevent the animal from escaping, according to a villager. The cub did not harm any person or animal in the village.
A delicate operation
Forest officials said the rescue could not be carried out using standard methods because the cub was very young and appeared unwell, making tranquilisation inadvisable. Instead, they placed a cage in position and used torchlight to attract the animal, waiting for it to walk into the enclosure. The cub was secured in the cage around noon.
"On closer examination of the tiger cub, it was ascertained that it required veterinary care," said Similipal Tiger Reserve field director Prakash Chand Gogineni. He added that the cub would be shifted to a larger enclosure within the core area of Similipal and released back into the wild once it was fit enough to hunt on its own.
Karanjia divisional forest officer Ajay Kumar Sahu said the Thakurmunda range office received information about the big cat's movement near the habitation, following which staff were deputed to the village.
Why the cub left the forest
Authorities are yet to determine why the cub moved out of the Similipal landscape. Officials said the animal is too young to hunt independently and appeared sick, suggesting it may have entered the house in search of shelter. Experts note that tiger cubs typically remain with their mothers for 12 to 18 months before venturing out alone.
The Similipal Tiger Reserve spans 845 square km and is Asia's second largest biosphere. It is the country's only wild habitat for melanistic royal Bengal tigers, a unique lineage with higher-than-normal melanin levels that gives the animals their distinctive black-and-yellow interspersed stripes.