Another Cheetah Baby Dies At Kuno National Park, Number Of Cubs Drops

The Forest Department team is engaged in ascertaining the cause of the death, said a Kuno forest officer.

New Delhi: A female cheetah cub named Jwala died at the Kuno National Park in Sheopur, Madhya Pradesh. With the death of the cheetah cub, the number of young cubs in the park has decreased from four to three. The Forest Department team is engaged in ascertaining the cause of the death, said a Kuno forest officer.

Notably, in the past few months, three cheetahs have already died at the National Park, raising fingers at the Kuno management and administration.

Siyaya, a female cheetah, gave birth to four cubs on March 24, the announcement of which was made on March 29. The sources at the Kuno National Park said that the four cubs are fathered by Freddie and that the mother and her quartet are in good condition.

Earlier in March, Shasha, a Namibian cheetah died from a kidney disease. Shasha was one of the eight cheetahs that were relocated from Namibia to Madhya Pradesh’s Kuno National Park. Shasha showed a sign of fatigue during her morning check-up and a medical examination revealed that she was dehydrated and had kidney-related problems. A further examination revealed that her creatinine levels were very high, which indicated an infection in the kidney.

Shasha was among the five female cheetahs that were flown in from Namibia earlier this year as part of an ambitious reintroduction programme. The cheetah was one of two five-year-old female big cats released in Kuno by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 17, which also happened to be his birthday, last year.

In the initial days, all cheetahs were kept under observation in quarantine. They were released into larger hunting enclosures in November.

According to the Action Plan for Cheetah Introduction in India, at least 10-12 cheetahs are required to be imported from African countries annually for the next 5 years. In this context, the Government of India initiated bilateral negotiations with the Republic of South Africa in 2021 for cooperation in the field of Cheetah conservation.

The world’s first intercontinental translocation project aims at reintroducing the big cats in the country.