Another species on the edge that is being monitored very closely. I'll be keeping everything crossed that numbers are up...
Wildlife conservationists will trawl the length and breadth of Brahmaputra and its tributaries for assessing the status of gangetic dolphin population from the first week of February.
Guwahati-based biodiversity conservation NGO,Aaranyak, in association with state forest department, will conduct the survey covering the Brahmaputra right from the Assam-Arunachal border to the Indo-Bangladesh border in Dhubri. Also the Brahmaputra's tributaries - Lohit,Dibang, Siang, Subansiri and Kulsi- will be covered in the survey.
"We will be covering a distance of about 1,100 km of Brahmaputra and its tributaries for the survey. This time, we will also attempt to go as far upstream of the tributaries in Arunachal Pradesh. By March we will be come out with the findings of our survey," Abdul Wakid, Aaranyak's Gangetic Dolphin Research and Conservation Programme (GDRCP) head, informed. In the 2008 survey by Aaranyak, 264 gangetic dolphins were found in a stretch of 1,031 km of Brahmaputra river system. The population was estimated around 250 in 2005.
