Bhubaneswar: Soon, visitors will have the opportunity to watch blackbuck, nilgai and hog deer at Odisha’s Sambalpur Zoo.
The Central Zoo Authority (CZA) has approved an animal exchange programme between Nandankanan Zoological Park (NZP) in Odisha capital here and Sambalpur Zoo recently, sources said.
Altogether eight blackbucks (four males & four females), eight nilgais (four males & four females) and eight hog deer (four males & four females) will be taken to Sambalpur Zoo from NZP under the animal exchange programme, said an official of Nandankanan today.
Similarly, a total of seven chausinghas (two males & five females) and five sambars (two males & three females) will be brought to NZP from Sambalpur Zoo, he added.
In the first phase, blackbucks will be handed over to Sambalpur Zoo while nilgais and hog deer will be transported in the second phase of the animal exchange programme.
“This animal exchange programme is expected to boost the possibility of captive breeding of chausingha at NZP and infuse new bloodline to the sambar population in the zoo,” said the official.
Notably, the state government had renamed Wild Animal Conservation Center (WACC) at Sambalpur as Sambalpur Zoo in July this year.
Sambalpur Zoo, one of the oldest zoos in Odisha and the biggest in Western Odisha, now houses around 300 animals, including leopard and sloth bear, sources said.
