New aviary complex comes up at Hyderabad Zoo

Hyderabad, Dec 23 A new aviary complex has come up in Hyderabad's Nehru Zoological Park, one of the biggest zoos in the country.

The state-of-the-art aviary complex, constructed in an area of 17,458 square feet and consisting of 36 enclosures for housing colourful Indian and exotic birds, was inaugurated by Telangana's Forests and Environment Minister A. Indrakaran Reddy on Thursday.

The enclosures have been enriched with shrubs, flowering plants, tall grasses, water pools and baths, perches, swings, nesting boxes etc. to give a natural look to the enclosures.

Constructed at a cost of Rs.1.33 crore, the aviary will display 680 birds belonging to 60 species from different continents like Asia, Australia, Africa and South America.

The zoo authorities constructed the new Aviary in place of the earlier Parrot World which was inaugurated by Dr. Salim Ali, the renowned ornithologist, in 1977.

Spread over an area of 380 acres, the Nehru Zoological Park (NZP) was established in 1959 by relocating the animals in erstwhile Zoo enclosures located in Public Gardens and opened to the public on October 6, 1963. It is home to 2016 mammals, birds and reptiles representing 193 species.

The zoo is abutting Mir-alam Tank which is an indigenous arch bund dam with 24 arches constructed 200 years ago.

In 1974, the NZP became the first zoo in the country to start the concept of Safari Park by establishing a Lion Safari Complex. It is also the first zoo to start Nocturnal Animal House, Open Butterfly Park and prehistoric Dinosaur Park.

Meanwhile, the zoo authorities on Thursday released four Indian Wild Dogs into the enclosure. The India wild dogs, also called Dhole (Cuon alpinus) were received from Pilikula Biological Park, Mangaluru, as a part of animal exchange programme with the NZP. The wild dogs were quarantined in the Zoo premises for four weeks before release, the zoo officials said.

Also called "Whistling Hunters", the Indian wild dogs hunt in packs numbering between 20 and 30 per pack. They can hunt herbivores like sambar, spotted deer, neelgai (black buck) etc.

Thursday also saw the inauguration of CC Camera Surveillance Monitoring System by the Forest Minister. For better security, monitoring of the Zoo premises, visitor management and also to study the animal behaviour, 200 CC Cameras covering the total zoo area of 380 acres have been installed.

The zoo authorities plan to install 250 more CC cameras in the second phase. The project was funded by the Central Zoo Authority and ZAPAT Schemes funds to a tune of Rs.1.60 crore.

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