At a time when the diminishing number of tigers in India is a cause of major concern for animal lovers and wildlife experts, there is good news from the Kaziranga National Park, one of the important tiger habitats in the country—the 2010 India Tiger Estimate has recorded considerable increase in the highly endangered animal population here.

Another independent study conducted by the Kaziranga National Park in collaboration with an NGO and Assam Forest Department recently corroborates these findings. The outcome of the six-month long exercise covering about 112 square kilometers in the core area of the park indicated presence of over 32 tigers within a 100 square kilometre area. "The study areawas divided into 50 grids, each measuring 1.5x1.5 sq.km. As many as 39 individual tigers (including a cub aged less than one year) were dentified in the camera trapped area, which indicates that the tiger is thriving in the Park," Dr Ahmed said.

The sprawling Kaziranga National Park, located in the flood plains of the Brahmaputra River, is an important tiger habitat in the country. According to wildlife experts, a major reason for the increase in its population could be because of the vast roaming space within the park.

Dr Firoz Ahmed, senior biologist with Aaranyak, an NGO working for bio-diversity conservation which has taken part in the camera-trapping survey says that Kaziranga's wellknown status as a high-density tiger area has been further emboldened because of the encouraging findings of the camera-trapping exercise.

The fact that there was little scientific data on tigers and prey animals necessitated such a survey. The outcome was essential for better management of tigers and prey animals in the landscape.

The exercise was in consultation with experts from the Wildlife institute of India and other relevant organisations.

The exercise worked like this: individual tigers were identified from photographs based on their unique stripe patterns. This information was analysed using a well established scientific framework.

"To find out suitable locations for camera traps that are frequented by tigers, we carried out a sign survey in the selected grids. Signs like pugmark, scat, scrap marks and kills are always left behind by tigers indicating their presence in an area.

We recorded all these signs during road and trail transects. Other than tiger signs, signs of prey and other animals were also recorded on transects. The sign survey was conducted by a team of biologists and forest staff from the nearest antipoaching camp," said Dr Firoz.

According to studies, Kaziranga has a high density of large prey animals that included wild buffalo and swamp deer. However, the park also harbours hog deer, swamp deer, sambar, rhino and elephants in relatively good number