Bhubaneswar, October 5 (Odisha.in) Orissa’s Nandankanan zoo will name its rescued elephant calf during the celebration of wild life week and on the elephant day on Sunday. The elephant was rescued from a village in Keonjhar district weeks ago.
A big hoarding depicting “Elephant Day” would be fixed at the Sambar Square and the the elephants would be nicely groomed and adorned and they would get a special treat on that day, zoo director A.K. Patnaik told Odisha.in.
The little elephant calf would be named by the school children. This would be done in form of a small contest and the winner would get a prize, he said.
The Nandankanan Zoological Park in collaboration with the Chandaka Wildlife Division, Nature and Wildlife Conservation Society, Orissa, WWF Orissa and CEE – Eastern Regional Cell, Orissa is going to observe the “Elephant Day” and the Wildlife Week.
A special education material in Oriya and English is developed depicting these issues and would be distributed to more than 5,000 visitors likely to throng Nandankanan on that day, he said.
School children are targeted for this special awareness campaign and the entry to the Nandankanan Zoological Park is made free for these budding conservationists. Virtually this week would be a free ride for them to the Park.
Two modern aviaries would be dedicated to the public on that day. The state of art aviary for the highly threatened White backed Vulture which is critically threatened would be dedicated to the public. The recently constructed aviary for the Brahminy Kite, whose number is also declining alarmingly, would be dedicated to the public.
There would be a mega quiz competition on “Wildlife of India” amongst the school children and would be conducted by a professional quiz master. The competition will commence at 9.30 AM.
This would be followed by two technical talk one would be on “Importance of Conservation of Amphibians and their Role in our Eco-system” by Dr. Susil Kumar Dutta, the renowned herpetologist.
It is a matter of concern that the number of the amphibians are declining alarmingly and the rapid extinction of many species is a matter of concern. So to generate awareness about these lesser known species special awareness materials are indented from Zoo Outreach Organization, Coimbatore for the students.
The students would be wearing special T Shirts with the message to conserve the amphibians. The talk would be followed by a small session on “Know your Amphibians” by the use of the special education kit from ZOO and would be conducted by Dr. Dutta.
This would be followed by a special talk on elephant conservation titled “Role of elephant in forest eco-system” by Sri S.K.Mishra, IFS (Retd), can eminent wildlife expert and ex-D.F.O. Chandaka Wildlife Division.
Special zoo education materials are procured from Zoo Outreach Organisation, Coimbatore for this occasion. The materials consists of the following; the education Kit on Frog matter …. to India, Frog T-shirts, Tiger Tool Kit, South Asian Primates Colouring Book, Monkey Manners, Just Bats, Bear T-shirts etc.
Odisha.in