Documenting India’s civilisational and natural heritage.
Thoothukudi’s salt pans are more than industrial landscapes. Their shallow saline waters can provide productive feeding and resting habitat for waterbirds. The combination of open water, exposed mud, microorganisms and other aquatic food resources creates conditions that attract flamingos and numerous smaller migratory species during their seasonal movements.
The new species has been recorded from deep waters off Kerala and the Wadge Bank region, where specimens were collected at depths ranging from approximately 400 to 600 metres. The largest known individual measured 131.5 centimetres, making the Arabian Skate a substantial member of India’s deep-sea batoid fauna.
Ongole cattle take their name from Ongole in present-day Prakasam district of Andhra Pradesh. Historically the area formed part of Nellore district, explaining why the breed was also widely known internationally as Nellore cattle.
Beyond creating a genetic reference for each species, the scientists reconstructed aspects of their ancient population history. Their analysis indicates that all four experienced substantial declines in effective population size during climatic fluctuations of the Pleistocene, revealing that the evolutionary history of these birds was shaped by environmental change long before today’s pressures from deforestation, hunting and habitat fragmentation emerged.
The release, carried out on 7 August 2026, included five Slender-billed Vultures (Gyps tenuirostris) and five White-rumped Vultures (Gyps bengalensis). The birds were released from the Jatayu Soft Release Centre at Tewaripal in Biswanath district under a long-running conservation programme aimed at rebuilding wild populations of South Asia’s severely depleted Gyps vultures.
The Smew was recorded during the waterbird survey covering important wetlands within the sanctuary, including Rowmari, Dondowa and Muamari beels. Forest officials described the sighting as the first documented occurrence of the species in Laokhowa Wildlife Sanctuary.
The bird was photographed on August 30, 2026, by NCR-based conservationist and birder Akshit Dua, who observed it actively feeding in shallow wetland habitat alongside Common Sandpipers and Wood Sandpipers. The identification was based on a combination of features including its prominent pale supercilium, rufous-streaked crown, eye-ring, rusty-brown scalloped upperparts and diffuse breast markings.
The survey was conducted jointly by the Thiruvananthapuram Wildlife Division and Warblers and Waders, a collective of birdwatchers involved in systematic monitoring of the protected area. The findings were reported on 26 August 2026 as part of an ongoing programme designed to document seasonal changes in Peppara’s bird communities.
The recording of 165 butterfly species within the Dehing Patkai landscape is significant because butterflies respond rapidly to changes in vegetation, humidity, temperature, availability of host plants and disturbance.
The newly described species, Ghatiana karnataka, was discovered at Mavinkaru in the Mookambika Wildlife Sanctuary of Udupi district, where it inhabits moist lateritic habitats within the central Western Ghats. Its formal description was published on 21 July 2026 in the journal Species by Santanu Mitra of the Zoological Survey of India and Ajmeer K of the Karnataka Forest Department.
