Study hints at 300+ fishing cats in tiger country

KOLKATA: The Sundarban Tiger Reserve (STR), home to at least 96 Bengal tigers, may also house more than 300 fishing cats, a study conducted by the STR, the first ever survey on the smaller cats in the reserve forest indicates.
The final numbers and other details of the study would only be released in consultation with the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), which is in the process of compiling data for an all-India tiger estimation report. But STR sources said it was safe to arrive at the 300+ number, based on the exercise conducted on camera trap images collected between December 2021 and and February this year.
This is the first statistical estimate of the fishing cat's numbers in the state. The final report will be part of 'Status of Tigers, Co-predators and Prey in India', due soon.
A senior forest department official said the survey was conducted, based on patterns of blotches on a fishing cat's body. "But a lot of fine-tuning still needs to be done as we await the final report," he said. "Identifying a fishing cat through blotches is a difficult task, and it needs to be a fool-proof exercise. When wet, the blotches look bigger but when dry, they look smaller. So, we had to do a meticulous study to make sure that we didn't count a cat twice," he added.
The fishing cat, more than 300 of which may be sharing space with 96 Bengal tigers in the STR, is categorised “vulnerable” on IUCN Red List. It is a territorial animal, which covers an area of hardly 2-3 square kilometres. “This behavioural pattern, too, was taken into account during the study,” a source added.
Commenting on the geological importance of the Sundarbans for fishing cats, Tiasa Adhya, member, IUCN species survival commission, said: “The entire Ganga-Brahmaputra floodplains and delta region is the most climatically suitable region for fishing cats. The Sundarbans delta represents a strictly protected section in this region.
In the light of these facts, the recent study is very important and much needed.” On the ecological importance of the exercise, Adhya said it was interesting, as mangrove habitats were hypothesized to be a less stable habitat for fishing cat than inland marshy habitats.
“This is because mangroves are inundated twice a day due to high tides and are therefore more dynamic, whereas inland marshes are inundated during monsoon and are more stable. Therefore, this population estimation is an important baseline count for fishing cats from less stable mangrove ecosystems, and can be compared to density estimates from more stable inland wetland ecosystems,” she said.