Gazelle

Indian Gazelle widely known as Chinkara belongs to the kingdom, Animalia.

Gazelle is referred from the family Bovidae and its sub family Antilopinae. The scientific name is Gazelle Bennettii and gene being the Gazella. Mammalia being its class and order is Artiodactyla. Mostly the species is spread-out in the South Asian regions. It has its own known appearance and looks like almost a deer. The quick classification of Chinkara is as below,

Kingdom	Animalia
Phylum	Chordata
Class	Mammalia
Order	Artiodactyla
Family	Bovidae
Subfamily	Antilopinae
Genus	Gazella
Species	G. bennettii

Physical Structure

The Indian Gazelle measures a height of approximately 65 cms and Gazelles usually weigh around 23kgs. They are reddish buff colored, with glossy fur and very smooth coat in the summer weather. While in the winter season, they have the white belly with throat fur resulting in natural look with extreme contrast. From the corner of its eyes, darkish chestnut stripes are seen in the side face, and those dark stripes are bordered by white shades.



The Indian Gazelles have these white shades in the borders of its muzzle. They have beautiful horns and usually its length ranges from 30 to 40 cms. The male Gazelles have even curved horns, usually they are smaller. Short legs and small in size are their own characteristics. Gazelles are nimble and beautiful that is one of the gifted species among the Wildlife animals.

Distribution and Habitat

Indian Gazelles do not have specific regions for its habitual growth.

But they are mostly found in the Grasslands and Desert regions in the northern parts of Indian sub-continent. Indian Gazelles are called shy animals as they always act themselves as an alert nature and usually it roams alone in the wild regions. Not very often these species are seen in groups, likely the count would be average in numbers in strength at times. The advantage of Gazelles are they can survive a long period without water and their needs of water gets compensated by the dews available in the leaves and plants.

Places Found

Gazelles are mainly seen in the below listed National parks in India:
• Gir National Park
• Panna National Park
• Ranthambore National Park
• Desert National Park
• Sariska National Park
• Bandhavgarh National Park

Gir National Park:

The Gir National Park is situated in Gujarat with an area of 120 square-miles with rich flora and habitat. Primarily, it is the home for lions and has good number of Gazelles as in the other national parks in India. Leopards can be seen at the border of the park during the summer seasons. Other Wildlife here includes Sambar deer, Chital, Jackal, Hyena, and Langur Monkeys. Jeep safari is conducted in order to view all the wildlife at Gir National park.

Bandhavgarh National Park:

Bandhavgarh National Park is located at Madhya Pradesh, India with an area of about 450 square kilometers. The thick forests of Bandhavgarh National Park sits in between the cliffs of the Vindhyan Mountains.

The forest has the wild attractions like Indian leopard, Elephants, Tiger, Nilgai,

Chausingha, Chital, Chinkara, Indian Muntjac Chital, Sambar, Wild Boar and Fox or Golden Jackal.Elephant safari and Jeep safari are conducted in order to view all the wildlife of Bandhavgarh National park.

Sariska National Park: The Sariska National Park in India is located in Alwar district of Rajasthan. The park is situated at a distance of 107 km from Jaipur and 200 km from Delhi. This area was a hunting reserve and it was declared a wildlife reserve in 1955. In 1978, the park was given the rank of a tiger reserve making it a part of India's Project Tiger system. The current area of the park is 866 kms. Most commonly spotted carnivores here are leopard, Bengal tiger, wild jackal, wild dog, sambhar, chital, Chinkara (Indian Gazelle) hyena, wild cat, nilgai, wild boar, etc.

Panna National Park:

Panna National Park is located in the state of Madhya Pradesh and mainly spreads out in the northern parts of the state, the Vindhyan Range and extends over Panna towards the Chhatarpur districts. This park was established in the year 1981 and is covering an area of 543 Sq.km.

The principal fauna here are Chinkara, Spotted deer, Bear, Panther, Blue bull, Tiger, Sambhar, Wild dog, Wolf, Jackal, Monkey, Crocodiles and apart from this birds of other species are also found here.

Ranthambore National Park:
The Ranthambore National Park located in Rajasthan is one of the largest national parks in Northern India with an area of 392 kms. Indian Gazelles are found in largest numbers than compared with other national parks in India.
The touristers here can sport various fauna like Leopards, tigers, sloth bears, hyena, cats, etc. Jeep and bus safaris are arranged for the touristers to view the game in Ranthambore Tiger reserve.

Desert National Park:
Desert National park is located near the Jaisalmer town of Rajasthan state. The park is covering a large area of 3162 square kilometers. Faunas that can be found here are Wolf, hedgehog, Desert Fox, Bengal Fox, Desert Cat, Black Buck and Chinkara (Indian Gazelle).

Food Habits

Indian gazelles are vegetation feeding species, they are falling under the category herbivorous,

and their intakes are plants, green grasses, herbs and occasionally fruits are also used as their diet. It is to be notified that gazelles prefer the food that are rich in protein and tannins is less in content, mainly by the under grown and female breeds during the winter season.

Mating Behaviour

Indian Gazelles do not have specific time for breeding. Even though,autumn and spring season are preferred as mating period for Gazelles. Five and a half months is usually the gestation period for the species. After a period of six months the female gazelles give birth to one or two new born, which is kept hidden in the grasses for days and it may long for weeks too and then it is taken care by its mother, until the breed get moved by its own and able to get under its mother's herd.

Population of Gazelles in India:

Gazelle's population was more than one lakh in number in India alone and that has declined to almost 75k to 85k due to their predators and hunting. Preventive measures have been taken by the Wildlife protection organization to completely remove hunting. In India, nearly 80% of gazelles are present in the Ranthambore National Park, in the Rajasthan state. These animals are found in large groups during the rainy season. Due to the extinction of Leopards in Indian country, it has brought down considerably the population of the Indian gazelles.

Threats to Indian Gazelle

Gazelles are always seem to be active and rarely wanders in the places of human and they always tend to keep a distance with the other species, however hunting has been the most significant threat for Gazelles and that has reduced a great number declining the population count, apart from this Predators being the Leopards and Dholes have also added threat for this species.

Poaching

A real time fact is that even the stray dogs in the Jaipur district are said to be predators for the Indian Gazelles that killed many in number.

Poaching is a major threat which majority of the wild life are facing. Indian Gazelles are hunted illegally and which has been a major threat for the endangered species in our country, hunted gazelles are mainly used for their meat and coat. It has been strictly prohibited and said to be illegal, for hunting of this endangered species.

Conservation effort in India

In India, teh gazelles are found in more than 80 protected areas. Religious belief in the northern parts of India shows that this species is protected as their sacred animal and hence the people in those parts protect the species. Indian country has enacted laws against killing of Gazelles.

Interesting Facts:

• Indian Gazelles can run at great speeds ranging from 50 to 60 Kms. Their alert nature helps them to get hunted from the predators like Hunters, Cheetah, etc.
• Salman khan, who is known to be a film actor, has been imprisoned for years, for his illegal hunting of the Indian Gazelle.
• In the North Western parts of the Indian country, people called as Bishnoi community protect this animal for their religious reason.
• It is believed that Goddess of fortune, called as Mrgasiras in the Epics and Puranas, means to be Gazelle.
• In Arabic literature Gazelles are compared to a woman's beauty.
• Indian Gazelle (Chinkara) is known as the state animal of Rajasthan in India.
• The advantage for Gazelles are that, its capability to withstand longer period without availability of real water source, allows it to survive in different kinds of Indian topology, with dew drops in plants and herbs.