World’s first fishing cat census done in Chilika.

June 6, 2022

According to a census done by the Chilika Development Authority (CDA) in collaboration with the Fishing Cat Project (TFCP),the ChilikaLake ( Asia’s largest brackish water lagoon) has 176 fishing cats,
This is the world’s first population estimation of the fishing cat done outside the protected area network.
According to the CDA, phase 1 of the estimation was conducted in 2021 in the 115 sq.km marshland in the north and northeastern section of Chilika and its surrounding areas.
Phase 2 was conducted in 2022 in the Parikud side along the coastal islands of Chilika. A total of 150 camera traps were deployed in two phases with each fixed in the field for 30 days.
According the CDA, spatially explicit capture recapture method was used to analyse the data.