ITANAGAR, Feb 03: Rajiv Gandhi University (RGU) has conducted a one-day awareness programme on ‘conservation of the Black- necked crane and its wintering site’ for the people of Sangti Valley in West Kameng district recently.
Speaking on the occasion, Assistant Professor of Zoology department, RGU, Dr Daniel Mize explained about the distribution, habitat, food habits, breeding cycle, migration, population & IUCN status and threats to Black-necked crane in Arunachal Pradesh and rest of the world. He also informed about the uncomfortable story about shrinking distribution range of Black-necked crane in the state in the recent past, mostly due to anthropogenic disturbances.
Sangti Middle School teachers Kesang Londhup Tuksipa and Subrata Chakravarty also spoke on the occasion. They emphasized on the need of awareness among the local people on conservation of all wintering sites of Black-necked crane. The locals of Sangti are also quite enthusiastic in conserving the Black-necked crane and its wintering habitats, they added. Recently locals have written to power department to shift the killer high voltage power line over the winter site of the crane at Sangti, they further informed.
In technical session, research scholars Jacob Ngukir and Tapak Tamir demonstrated technique to photograph birds and to observe and identify birds using binocular, spotting scope, range finder, field guide etc to the participants in the programme.
