Big cat on Icrisat campus finally caught

TNN | Aug 25, 2014

The five-year-old big cat was at large ever since it was spotted on the campus five months ago. 

HYDERABAD: After five months of playing hide and seek, the leopard that had made the sprawling International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) campus its home, was finally captured early on Sunday.

The five-year-old big cat was at large ever since it was spotted on the campus five months ago. Several attempts were made by forest officials to trap it, including with live bait and even a perfume containing pheromones. When these did not work, they tried to lure it with a female panther brought from the zoo. But the animal, which the officials termed as 'smart', remained elusive. But on Sunday morning its luck ran out after it got caught in a snare kept near a live bait. The zoo staff who reached the spot after being informed by Icrisat officials tranquilized and relieved the leopard from the trap. Its health was assessed and when veterinarians gave the go ahead, it was transported to Mannanur in the Srisailam Tiger Reserve area, about 200 km from Patancheru, where it was let loose.

"It is a huge sigh of relief for us. We had tried everything in the last few months to trap the leopard. We tracked its movements with cameras and could see how it eluded us after getting nearly caught on many occasions," said Telangana chief wildlife officer P K Sharma.

Sharma said Icrisat campus was an ideal environment for the leopard to survive owing to the abundance in availability of food and thick forest cover. Luckily, despite its prolonged stay on the campus, it did not attack any humans.

Officials suspect that the leopard could have strayed from the Narasapur forest reserve, 20 km away from Patancheru. Forest officials said it was not uncommon for big cats to stray near human settlements when food becomes scarce in their habitats.

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