Himalayan Brown Bear
Q. The war and the movement of troops in Kargil impacted the habitat of which animal the most?- Published on 30 May 16a. Himalayan Brown Bear
b. Snow leopard
c. Panda
d. Fox
ANSWER: Himalayan Brown Bear
- The J&K Wildlife Department has recorded its first ever sighting of a group of eight Himalayan brown bears in Kargil’s Drass Sector, where the 1999 war had wreaked havoc with their habitats.
- No such sighting has ever been reported from J&K, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, where these animals are distributed.
- The sighting of such relatively large numbers of Himalayan brown bears in just one wildlife zone out of four major areas of Suru, Zanskar, Drass and Kargil in the Ladakh region is a positive indication.
- A brown bear requires about 100 square kilometer as its territory to survive and any human intervention disturbs its ecology.
- Sightings of brown bear, which is on the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources' list of vulnerable animals, has come down significantly in Kashmir Valley too in the past few decades.
