Oryx Vol 41 No 1 January 2007

Short Communication
Preparations for the reintroduction of Asiatic lion Panthera leo persica
into Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary, Madhya Pradesh, India

A.J.T. Johnsingh, S.P. Goyal and Qamar Qureshi

Abstract Approximately 300 Asiatic lions Panthera leo moving of two villages, grassland management and
persica are confined to the 1,883 km2 Gir forests in building a rubble wall around the Division to keep out
Gujarat, western India. To establish a second home for livestock would lead to a substantial rise in the
the Asiatic lion in its former range, Kuno Wildlife population of ungulates (to c. 20 animals km22) by the
Division (1,280 km2, with a core 345 km2 Sanctuary) has end of 2007. This density would support the first group
been identified in Madhya Pradesh. To assess whether of five lions (three females and two males) due to be
the Sanctuary has sufficient wild ungulates to support a reintroduced in the beginning of 2008. Even if all the
population of lions 17 transects totaling 461 km were three females raise cubs there will be sufficient wild
surveyed over an area of 280 km2 in early 2005. The prey by the end of 2009 to support the males, females
density of potential ungulate prey was 13 animals km22. and cubs.
There are also c. 2,500 feral cattle, left behind by
translocated villagers; the cattle are considered to be Keywords Asiatic lion, canine distemper, India, Kuno
buffer prey in case droughts adversely affect the Wildlife Sanctuary, Panthera leo persica, reintroduction,
populations of wild ungulates. Control of poaching, ungulates.

The only free-ranging population of Asiatic lions epidemic of this scale were to affect the lions in Gir, it
Panthera leo persica, categorized as Critically would be difficult to save them from extinction, given
Endangered on the IUCN Red List (IUCN, 2006), exists the much smaller area of the lion habitat and the
in Gir Wildlife Sanctuary (1,154 km2), Gir National Park considerably smaller population. The establishment of a
(259 km2) and surrounding forests (470 km2), an area second free-ranging population of Asiatic lions would
totalling 1,883 km2 in Gujarat, western India (Singh, help to guard against this.
1996; Johnsingh et al., 1998). The total lion population is An attempt to establish such a population in
c. 300. Such small animal populations restricted to single Chandrprabha Sanctuary, Uttar Pradesh in 1957 failed
sites face a variety of extinction threats from genetic (Negi, 1965) because of a lack of monitoring and the
and environmental factors (Gilpin & Soule, 1986). small size of the Sanctuary (96 km2), and because lions
Catastrophes such as an epidemic, an unexpected moved outside the Sanctuary, leading to conflicts with
decline in prey or reprisal killing by people could result people and poisoning and poaching of the lions
in the extinction of a threatened species when it is (Divyabhanusinh, 2005). However, in a renewed attempt
restricted to a single site. The outbreak of canine to establish a second population of lions, surveys of
distemper in the lions of the Serengeti National Park, Sitamata and Darrah-Jawaharsagar Wildlife Sanctuaries
Tanzania, in 1994 killed an estimated 30% of the (Rajasthan) and Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary (Madhya
population (Roelke-Parker et al., 1996). The lion popula- Pradesh) were made by the Wildlife Institute of India
tion in the 40,000 km2 Serengeti-Mara ecosystem is large, in 1993–94. The 345 km2 Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary, 830 km
with c. 2,500 lions (Bauer & Van der Merwe, 2004). If an north-east of Gir (Fig. 1), established in 1981, was
identified as the most suitable site because it lies within
a large forested area of 3,300 km2 (Chellam et al., 1995)
A. J. T. Johnsingh (Corresponding author)*, S. P. Goyal and Qamar Qureshi
Wildlife Institute of India, PO Box 18, Chandrabani, Dehra Dun 248 001, India. that could support a growing population of intro-
E-mail ajtjohnsingh@ncf-india.org duced lions within former lion range (Pocock, 1930;
*Current address: Nature Conservation Foundation, 3076/5, IV Cross, Chellam, 1993). The Government of India and the
Gokulam Park, Mysore 570 002, India. State Government of Madhya Pradesh were receptive
Received 14 July 2005. Revision requested 14 December 2005. to the recommendations made by the Wildlife Institute
Accepted 30 March 2006. of India and between 1996 and 2001, 24 villages (Fig.

93
ß 2007 FFI, Oryx, 41(1), 93–96 doi:10.1017/S0030605307001512 Printed in the United Kingdom

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 94 A. J. T. Johnsingh et al.

Fig. 1 Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary, showing the 17 transects (thick lines) walked for prey assessment, the surrounding forest divisions, and
villages. The inset shows the locations of Gir National Park, Gujarat, and Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary, Madhya Pradesh, in India.

1) containing 1,547 families were translocated from the c. USD 3.4 million in programmes related to the
Sanctuary. The villagers were willing to move out as Sanctuary.
they were facing problems due to lack of a market, An assessment of the prey base for any lions
hospitals and all-weather road facilities, and harass- reintroduced to Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary was carried
ment from dacoits. The Government provided them out in January-February 2005. Seventeen transects of
with an appropriate relocation package. A 1,280 km2 1.8–3.2 km, over an area of c. 280 km2, were walked
Kuno Wildlife Division, encompassing the Sironi, Agra 17 times each. The total distance covered was 461 km.
and Morawan forest ranges around the Sanctuary, was The transects were walked in the mornings and
also demarcated. The Government has so far spent evenings, and for each sighting of ungulates sighting

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 Preparations for lion reintroduction 95

distance and angle were recorded. Analysis of transect This is low compared to African lions, which have
data was based on the Distance model (Laake et al., values of 0.567 and 1.0, respectively (Uphyrina &
1994). No tiger pugmarks were seen during the survey, O’Brien, 2003). This makes it imperative to eventually
although tigers have been reported from the Sanctuary replace old males in Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary with
area in the past (Chellam et al., 1995). The density of young males from Gir (Chellam et al., 1995). This should
potential wild prey (spotted deer Axis axis, sambar be done preferably when the females have grown-up
Cervus unicolor, nilgai Boselaphus tragocamelus and wild cubs, as new males could kill the young sired by other
pig Sus scrofa) for lions was 13 animals km22, giving a males (Schaller, 1972). It may also be necessary to
total of c. 3,600 animals available in the Sanctuary introduce females from Gir periodically to enhance
(Johnsingh et al., 2005). Estimation of the number of genetic vigour. Other recommendations (Johnsingh
cattle, left behind by the translocated villagers, by the et al., 2005) will also need to be implemented in advance
line transect method is not necessarily reliable as the of any reintroduction: the villages of Bankcha and
cattle occur in large groups confined to specific Jangarh (Fig. 1) should be relocated from Sironi forest
locations. Therefore we used a population estimate range (to add a further 300 km2 of human-free habitat
based on counting the cattle at yarding sites, which gave to the Sanctuary), grassland management is required to
a minimum of 2,500 in 2004 (Khudsar & Chundawat, improve forage availability, and a rubble wall needs to
2004). Including cattle, the estimated total potential prey be built around the Kuno Wildlife Division to keep out
was c. 6,100 animals. We consider other large mammals livestock. In addition, there will need to be recruitment
in the Sanctuary, the arboreal langur Semnopithecus and training of staff, control of poaching, and launching
entellus, chowsingha or four-horned antelope Tetracerus of a public awareness and conservation education
quadricornis and the fleet-footed chinkara Gazella bennet- campaign about coexistence with a large and potent-
tii, as prey rarely available to lions. ially dangerous carnivore (Kellert et al., 1996). The
The energy or prey requirements of a carnivore can be Government of India and Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat
determined using body weight (Carbone & Gittleman, Forest Departments are working on the implementation
2002). Therefore, to estimate the prey requirements of of the lion translocation, and the Forest Department of
lion we used the data available for tiger, which is almost Madhya Pradesh has initiated the habitat improvement
equivalent to lion in body weight. A female tiger kills programme.
40–45 ungulates per year, consuming c. 2,000 kg of meat
(c. 3,000 kg of live prey) for maintenance, and when
raising three cubs needs c. 60–75 prey animals per year;
Acknowledgements
males require c. 4,000 kg of live prey per year (Sunquist
et al., 1999). Assuming that 50 wild ungulates can We thank the Director of the Wildlife Institute of
support one lion for 1 year, on average, then five lions India and Madhya Pradesh Forest Department for
(three females and two males) will require a total of c. support. Thanks are also due to Mr J.S. Chauhan,
250 wild ungulates per year. Medium to large predators Director, Kuno Wildlife Division for the support
in various ecosystems remove 9–10% of estimated prey extended for field work, Mr Fayaz Khudsar for sharing
biomass per year (Schaller, 1972; Karanth et al., 2004). his knowledge of Kuno and assistance in field, Dr Nima
Therefore we estimate that in 2007, 5–8 lions could be Manjrekar for reading through the manuscript and Drs
supported by the then estimated 19 animals km22 in M. Agarwal and D. Bakar for help in preparation of the
Kuno. Johnsingh et al. (2005) recommended, however, map.
that the lions (three females and two males) should be
introduced into Kuno in the beginning of 2008 to ensure
that the prey base is greater than required. Based on the References
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Kellert, S.R., Black, M., Rush, C.R. & Bath, A.J. (1996) Human
culture and large carnivore conservation in North America. A.J.T. Johnsingh has studied species ranging from fishes to
Conservation Biology, 10, 977–990. elephants, including mammalian carnivores, and he studied
Laake, J.L., Buckland, S.T., Anderson, D.R. & Burnham, K.P. dholes Cuon alpinus in Bandipur Tiger Reserve, south India,
(1994) DISTANCE: Software and Users Guide. Colarado State in the late 1970s. After retirement from the Wildlife Institute
University, Fort Collins, USA. of India in October 2005 he has worked for WWF-India and
Negi, S.S. (1965) Transplanting of Indian lion in Uttar Pradesh the Nature Conservation Foundation, Mysore.
state. Cheetal, 12, 98–101.
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Natural History Society, 34, 638–635. including elephants, and large carnivores, focusing in
Roelke-Parker, M.E., Munson, L., Packer, C., Kock, R., particular on leopard-human conflict in the Himalayas. He
Cleveland, S., Carpenter, M., O’Brien, S.J., Pospichil, A., has also developed a forensic facility at the Wildlife Institute
Hoffman-Lehmann, R., Lutz, H., Mwamengele, G.L.M., of India.
Mgasa, M.N., Machange, G.A., Summers, B.A. & Appel, Qamar Qureshi is a specialist in geographical informa-
M.J.G. (1996) A canine distemper virus epidemic in Serengeti tion systems, remote sensing, landscape ecology and large
lions (Panthera leo). Nature, 379, 441–445. mammal conservation. He presently assists the Government
Schaller, G.B. (1972) The Serengeti Lion: A Study of Predator-Prey of India to assess tiger populations.
Relations. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, USA.

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