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Ecology & Environment
Mahesh

06/02/24 06:54 AM IST

Seven cheetahs born in Kuno

In News
  • Wildlife officials in Madhya Pradesh’s Kuno National park are ecstatic about the birth of seven cheetah cubs in January this year.
Different stages in a Cheetah cub’s life
  • According to the Cheetah Conservation Fund, the gestation period for a cheetah is 93 days, and litters range in size from one to six cubs.
  • At birth, the “cubs weigh 8.5 to 15 ounces and are blind and helpless” and their “mother will groom them patiently, purring quietly and providing them warmth and security.”
  • The cubs will live in a secluded nest for the next six to eight weeks, being regularly moved by their mother from nest to nest to avoid detection by predators.
  • The cubs begin joining their mother on its daily travels around six weeks of age.
  • This period is fraught with danger for the cubs, with “less than one in 10 surviving.”
  • The only protection that a cub has apart from its mother — whose mobility is restricted due to the babies — is a “long mantle of hair on their backs, which serves the dual purpose of keeping them warm and helping hide them from predators who mistake them for the aggressive honey badger.”
  • Between four to six months of age, cheetah cubs are very active and playful as they begin gripping tall ‘play trees’ that they climb. These trees serve as observational points that will one day help them survey the landscape for prey and keep a look out for predators.
  • Around one year of age, the cubs begin hunting with the mother, learning important skills like prey detection, stalking, chasing, tripping (prey capture), and killing by means of a suffocation bite.
  • At about 18 months, they seperate from their mother. While male siblings form a coalition and hunt together, the females lead a solitary life, until their own cubs are born.
Chances of Survival
  • First-time mothers often lose their entire first litter, but learn important lessons in the process.
  • There is a concern among experts that weak genetics accumulated may persist among the captive cheetahs and eventually weaken the gene pool, resulting in animals that need constant human intervention for survival.
  • Housing cheetahs in small enclosures has been linked to “stress related behaviors, medical conditions and reduced reproductive performance.
Kuno National Park
  • Kuno National Park is a national park in the Sheopur district of MP established in 1981 as a wildlife sanctuary. In 2018, it was given the status of a national park. It is part of the Khathiar-Gir dry deciduous forests.
  • Kuno National Park has spread over an area of 748.76 sq. km.
  • One of the main tributaries of the Chambal River, the Kuno River, cuts across the whole length of the National Park division.
  • The Kuno has the potential to carry populations of all four of India’s big cats. The tiger, the leopard, the Asiatic lion, and also the cheetah all four of which have coexisted within the same habitats. Historically before they were exhausted by overhunting and habitat destruction.
  • Currently, the leopard and striped hyena are the only larger carnivores within the Kuno National Park, the single lone tiger T-38 having returned to Ranthambore earlier this year (2021).
Source- Indian Express

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