JALPAIGURI: Camera traps laid by the
Sikkim
forest department have captured pictures of a
Royal Bengal tiger
at Gamtangpu above Lachen in north Sikkim at an altitude of 3,600 metres.
The picture clicked by the camera trap on June 21 in Naga area has given ecologists reason to believe the Royal Bengal
tiger
can exist at higher altitudes given an undisturbed habitat. In December, one of these big cats was clicked in Dibang Valley,
Arunachal Pradesh
, at a height of 3,630m. This remains the highest point at which a Royal Bengal tiger has ever been clicked.
“There is every possibility of tigers being present at an altitude of over 3,630 metres. I am sure more such pictures will surface,” said Animesh Basu of Himalayan Nature and Adventure Foundation (HNAF).
The animal was spotted through camera traps set by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) as part of its special high-altitude tiger project under the
National Tiger Conservation Authority
(NTCA). A similar project for tiger conservation has been initiated by WWF in West Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.
“Over the past few years, people in north Sikkim were giving accounts of sighting tigers, but those could not be corroborated. In the last three years, there have been reports of cattle-lifting, but no one was certain of what animal was taking them. This is undeniable evidence,” a forest department official said.