Radio-tracking of western tragopan (Tragopan melanocephalus) in Great Himalayan National Park, India

Abstract

Attempts were made to radio-tag western tragopan (Tragopan melanocephalus) to study the habitat use and movement pattern in Great Himalayan National Park, India. Fall net and leg-hold noose were used to trap birds. One female tragopan was caught in the leg-hold noose in May 1999, and was radio-tagged using necklace type collar. Both home-in and triangulation methods were adopted to record radio-locations and the home range was estimated using Minimum Convex Polygon method. The habitat use was studied by overlaying radiolocations and home range polygons on the spatial layer on vegetation, digital elevation model, aspect and slope, and also by studying random plots. Though trapping was tried for three months (April - June) with total trap efforts of 256 man-days and 6694 trap hours, trap success was very low for western tragopan (of just one bird). The overall home range of the radio-tagged bird was estimated to be 31.6 ha and for summer and autumn, the home range was 20.5ha and 4.7ha respectively. The bird moved between the elevation ranges 2530m and 2710m in summer and between 2440m and 2530m in autumn, and in both the seasons the bird was using broad leaf dominated forests with moderate level of canopy cover and shrub density. Though conclusive results could not be drawn from a study based on just one individual, the findings appear to largely concur with the earlier studies on the species and its congeners.