World Lion Day: Asiatic lions used to inhabit most of southwest Asia & India

World Lion Day: Asiatic lions used to inhabit most of southwest Asia & India

Subject : Environment

Section: Biodiversity

Context: World Lion da

Concept

• The only free-roaming population of Asiatic lions in the world has been in Gujarat, India, for the last 130 years. But before that, the lion subspecies inhabited most of southwest Asia and were present across India.
• The big cat subspecies Panthera leoleo, earlier called Panthera leo persica, are found in the Gir National Park and outside the protected areas in Gujarat. According to the latest survey, there are 674 lions in the state, 300 inside the protected area of about 1,200 square kilometres, while the rest are spread out over 30,000 sq km.
• African and Asiatic lions were separated about 55,000 years ago and then evolved into two different subspecies. The Asiatic lion was found in north Africa thousands of years ago along the Mediterranean, Asia Minor, India and perhaps a part of Europe
• While tigers prefer dense jungles whenever they can find them, lions are more grassland creatures. Even if lions and tigers occupied the same landscapes, the chances of interactions between the two were less, but they did co-exist
• Lions live and have lived across a wide variety of habitats ranging from deserts, coasts, grasslands, savannah woodlands, scrub, dry and wet forests, including rainforest and mountains
• The Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change had identified sites in 2020 for possible lion relocation, namely,
  • Madhav National Park and Gandhi Sagar Wildlife Sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh (MP),
  • Sitamata Wildlife Sanctuary, Mukundra Hills Tiger Reserve and Kumbhalgarh Wildlife Sanctuary in Rajasthan and
  • Jessore-BalaramAmbaji WLS and adjoining landscape in Gujarat.
• The “Asiatic Lion Conservation Project” has been launched by the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC).

Bombay Natural History Society

• The Bombay Natural History Society, founded on 15 September 1883, is one of the largest non-governmental organisations in India engaged in conservation and biodiversity research.
• BNHS is the partner of BirdLife International in India. It has been designated as a ‘Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation’ by the Department of Science and Technology.
• The BNHS logo is the great hornbill, inspired by a great hornbill named William, who lived on the premises of the Society from 1894 until 1920

African and Asiatic lions

• Asiatic lions are slightly smaller than African lions.
• The most striking morphological character, which is always seen in Asiatic lions, and rarely in African lions, is a longitudinal fold of skin running along its belly.
• Asiatic Lion IUCN Red List: Endangered, African Lion IUCN Red List: Vulnerable