Sepahijala Wildlife Sanctuary (SWL)

About Sepahijala Wildlife Sanctuary (SWL):

• Location: It is located around 25 km from Agartala, Tripura.
• History:
  • To conserve and propagate the biodiversity of the area, the Sepahijala bio-complex came into existence in 1972.
  • With the addition of a botanical garden, a deer park, and a zoo, the bio-complex was subsequently attributed the status of Sepahijala Wildlife Sanctuary in early 1987.
  • It is spread over 18.5 sq. km and is home to migratory birds and animals.
  • The wildlife sanctuary is divided into five sections, basically to segregate the different types of animals living here. They are the carnivore section, primate section, ungulate section, reptile section, and aviary section.
  • It also has two natural lakes, namely Abasarika and Amrit Sagar.
  • Clouded Leopard National Park, established in 2007, is a part of SWL.
• Vegetation: Moist deciduous forest
• Flora: The sanctuary has no less than 456 plant species; many kinds of bamboo and a variety of grasses and medicinal plants also grow in the sanctuary.
• Fauna:
  • It is the habitat of different species of primates like Rhesus macaque, Pigtailed macaque, Capped langur, Spectacled monkey, Slow loris and several other wild animals like Leopard, Clouded leopard, Jungle fowl, Civets, Barking, Deer, Wild pig, etc.
  • The crab-eating mongoose (which was last seen in the 1930s) has also been revived here.
  • The avian population of the sanctuary is also rich, with a variety of winged stork, Whistling teal, and the White ibis. 

Q1: What is a Clouded Leopard?

It is a wild cat inhabiting dense forests of the Himalayas through mainland Southeast Asia into South China. The clouded leopard is categorised into two species: the mainland clouded leopard distributed from central Nepal to peninsular Malaysia, and the Sunda clouded leopard (Neofelis diardi) native to Borneo and Sumatra.It also has rotating rear ankles that enable it to climb down head first from trees, unlike the other felines.It is the State animal of Meghalaya.It is classified as Vulnerable under the IUCN Red List.

Source:Tripura's Sepahijala Wildlife Sanctuary gets new batch of animals including two tigers