Project radio collar to track elephants

Calcutta: An operation to track the real-time location and movement of elephant herds in south Bengal, which could go a long way in reducing human-animal conflict, will start on Wednesday.

A team of experts tasked with tagging matriarchs of two elephant herds with radio collars will leave Calcutta for a West Midnapore forest on Wednesday morning.

Matriarchs rule the elephant kingdom and using a radio collar on the female leader will enable forest officials to monitor the movement of the entire herd.

Herds from Jharkhand's Dalma range stray into villages in the south Bengal districts of Bankura, West Midnapore and Jhargram every year, destroying crop and occasionally killing humans.

"According to reports from our men on the ground, there are around 30 elephants in south Bengal at the moment, split into two herds. There may be one or two stray male elephants other than that. One of the herds is in the Lalgarh forest in West Midnapore and the other in Jhargram's Jamboni forest," said Sakti Sankar Dey, chief conservator of forest, western circle, who will monitor the operation from Calcutta.

The GPS-enabled radio collars will provide updates in real time about the location of a herd and help track them within the state as well as during migration. A tool embedded in the collar will send signals 24X7.

"This is the first time elephants will be radio collared in south Bengal," Dey said.


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