Group Size and Age-sex Composition of Gaur (Bos gaurus) in Kuldhia Wildlife Sanctuary, Eastern Ghats, India

摘要

The Gaur is underthevulnerable categoryon Red listand Schedule-I speciesasper Wildlife Protection Act (1972) in India. Till date, little information isavailableongroupsizeand age-sexcompositionof Gaurfrom KuldhiaWildlifeSanctuary. Thus, by keeping the same in mind an investigation of group sizeand age-sexcompositionof Gaurwascarried outduring January to June 2013 inKuldhia Wildlife Sanctuary. In addition, the secondary sources of data from2007-2013 werealsocollected from forestdepartment. During investigation 26direct sightings and 72 saltlick record from different part of the sanctuary wasconsidered. A total of 14 group-sizes were recorded and the group size variedfrom one to eighteen individuals. Solitary male group constitute 27.55%(n=27), which is the dominant group size from other three group (Mixed, allmale and all female). For age and sex composition, gaur mainly classif ied intofour type's i.e. adult male, adult female, juvenile (sub adult male and female)and calf. Total 98 (saltlick and direct sighting data) sightings consisted 453individuals of gaur in KWLS, out of which 27 sightings were of loners. All theloners were adult male and they were found apart from the groups. Adult maleconstitute 22.51% (n=102) from the total numberof gaursighted.