Prey Selection by Bengal Tiger (Panthera tigris tigris, Linnaeus 1758) in Chitwan National Park, Nepal

Abstract

The Tiger is a top carnivore of forest and grassland ecosystem. Prey selection by Bengal Tiger (Panrhera tigris tigris,Linnaeus 1758) was studied in the Chitwan National Park(CNP), Nepal from February to April 2014. The CNP represent a huge numbers of Tiger in Nepal.The overall objective of this study was to find out the baseline information on prey selection by Tiger in CNP. The specific objectives of the study were a)To describe the contribution of domestic animals to the diet of Bengal Tiger and b) To examine the dietcomposition of Bengal Tiger. In the study site, 85 scats of Bengal Tiger were collected by opportunistically in fire land area, grass land and river bank and scat sampling method (scat analysis) was employed. From the each scat sample, 20 hairs were selected randomly for treatment and both cuticle and medulla were treated. Tiger selected 08 different taxa and Chital was a major prey species (44.95 %) to diet of Tiger. Other principal prey species were Sambar (22.93 %), Wild Pig (14.67 %), Hog deer (9.17 %), Barking deer (3.66 %), and Gaur (1.83 %). Small component (2.73 %) of the Tiger’s diet was domestic livestock(buffalo 1.83% and cattle 0.9%). The result of the study suggests that there might bedomestic animals in component of Tiger’s diet would be illegal grazing in some areas of CNP by domestic livestock. Key words:Scat sampling, Chital, domestic livestock