35 #leopards roam around freely in Mumbai’s western suburbs

By Maggie Davis  | June 30, 2015

Mumbai, June 30: A survey was conducted between December 2014 and April 2015 by the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) along with Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) to get the figure of the big cats roaming around. It is found that 35 leopards are roaming around the western suburbs of Mumbai.
It is estimated that in SGNP there are 21 leopards per 100 sq/km and there were 35 in Aarey Milk Colony (AMC) and the nearby areas where camera trapping was done. According to the reports by Mid-Day, sources revealed that Nikit Surve the researcher, got images of the leopard in AMC which showed numerous leopard movements in the area. The research area was divided into 3 zones, each covered with 15 cameras. It was done to get better understanding of the big cats roaming freely in the area.

The 45 days plus research involved trapping the leopards from a camera in order to know the big cats’ population in and around SGNP area. Mumbai-based Nikit Surve was the expert who started the research from February 2015 onwards. Nikit is pursuing Masters Degree from WII in Dehradun. (Image Credits – Twitter)

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