About

• This is the second consecutive year that an increase in the population of the animal had been recorded in the park.
• The almost 8% increase in the population of the iconic animal in 2019 follows a similarly significant increase in its population in 2018.

Nilgiri tahr

• Nilgiri tahrs are stocky goats with short, coarse fur and a bristly mane.
• Males are larger than the females, and have a darker colour when mature. Both sexes have curved horns, which are larger in the males, reaching up to 40 cm for males and 30 cm for females.
• Adult males develop a light grey area or “saddle” on their backs and are hence called “saddlebacks”
• IUCN status - Endangered

Conservation Issues

• The Nilgiri tahr symbolizes the conflicts inherent in conservation of threatened fauna and their habitat.
• Their number totals around 2200-2500 individuals in the wild.
• Nilgiri tahrs exist only in small, isolated populations due to extreme habitat fragmentation and illegal hunting. They are, as a result, vulnerable to local extinction.
• The reasons for the decline of tahr populations have not been fully understood.
• The species has always been under severe stress on account of the construction of numerous hydroelectric projects, timber felling and monoculture plantation of eucalyptus and wattles.
• All these development activities, especially the plantation activities affect the heart of the tahr habitat, which are the grasslands – sholas.