No rhinos poached in Chitwan National Park in 2011

503 rhinos in Chitwan National Park 

January 2012. The Nepali Forest Ministry has decided to declare 2011 as ' Successful year in rhino conservation'.

Since January 3, 2011, no rhino has been poached in Chitwan National Park. In 2011 the only rhinos deaths recorded were due to old age. According to former warden Narendraman Babu Pradhan, there are 503 rhinos in Chitwan.

Courtesy of Wildlife Watch Group Nepal 

Counting snow leopards in Nepal - Fewer than thought

Counting cats: the endangered snow leopards of the Himalayas
November 2011. The elusive snow leopard (Panthera uncia) lives high in the mountains across Central Asia. It is thought to occur across 12 countries but the actual numbers of this beautiful large cat are largely unknown.

350-500 in Nepal
It is thought that there might be somewhere between 350 and 500 distributed across Nepal's northern frontier. New research has used genetic analysis to show that the numbers of snow leopards in the central Himalayas is actually much lower than suggested.

Snow leopards prefer to live solitary lives in rugged, inaccessible habitats. Most estimates of the number of snow leopards depends on counting signs, such as tracks (pugmarks), scrapes, their droppings (scat), camera trapping and talking to local residents. Researchers from Nepal analyzed snow leopard scats originally collected to look at leopard diet from Shey Phoksundo National Park and Kangchanjunga Conservation Area of Nepal.

DNA testing to determine population numbers
Despite the age of these samples (some had been stored for up to three years prior to this study) the team, led by Dibesh Karmacharya, was able to isolate and interpret genetic data from scats identified as snow leopard in the field.

Fewer than thought
They found that only 19 of the original 71 samples were actually P. uncia (the rest were other carnivores or were too degraded for genetic analysis). Of the 19 positively identified samples only 10 were successfully genotyped, these were found to come from nine individuals, three males and six females, with a mix of males and female in both of the national parks.

Mr. Karmacharya commented, "In conjunction with our national and international partners we are the first team using genetics to look at conservation of snow leopards in Nepal. This method has the advantage over traditional methods - it is non-invasive and does not require us to disturb the cats in any way. We have also been able to show that traditional methods of counting snow leopards overestimate the size of the population. With more (and fresher) samples) we will be able to investigate the family relationships, genetic diversity, social structure and territories of snow leopards, and better understand how to conserve this endangered animal."

The research was published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Research Notes

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/snow-leopard-nepal.html

Kiwi adventurer leads Yeti hunt

NEIL REID - Sunday News

Mike Allsop, who conquered Mt Everest three years ago, is searching for the skull and skeletal hand of what was said to be a mythical "Abominable Snowman".

The controversial artefacts were stolen from a monastery in the tiny Nepalese village of Pangboche, in the 1990s.

"I am hoping that the person who has them wants to give them back," Allsop told Sunday News. "I hope they will have an alert set up on their computer for whenever the artefacts are mentioned on the internet.

"I am offering... to go and reclaim them. I will go anywhere in the world in person, free of charge, no questions asked and I will also buy them a beer."

Weta Workshops has created life-sized replicas of the skull and hand to help searchers find the real things.

Allsop, 41, is an Air New Zealand pilot and was introduced to Weta boss Sir Richard Taylor by Air NZ chief executive Rob Fyfe.

Allsop will hand-deliver the replicas to the monastery when he and 17 Air NZ co-workers travel to Pangboche in April.

The original Pangboche hand and skull came to international prominence in the 1950s.

Texan adventurer and oil magnate Tom Slick photographed the items during one of his early missions to find the Yeti in 1957.

Two years later, one of Slick's team returned to the Pangboche monastery.

He reportedly drank Scotch with a monk until the local passed out, before stealing bone fragments from the hand. He then supposedly replaced the bones with those from a human hand, before rewrapping the Pangboche hand to disguise his theft.

The stolen fragments were allegedly smuggled back to America by a Hollywood star.

Then in 1999, the skull and what remained of the skeletal hand were stolen from the monastery.

Allsop, who scaled Mt Everest in 2007, was intrigued when he learned of the artefacts and determined to reclaim them for the monastery.

"These were very treasured artefacts," he said. "There was a huge outrage when they were stolen.

"The monks initially wouldn't show them to anyone, then slowly they showed them... unfortunately they showed them to one person too many."

Asked whether he believed in the existence of the Abominable Snowman, Allsop said: "A big part of me says, `Yes, the Yeti does exist'. Then the logical side goes, `Maybe it is a breed of bear or other type of animal which is yet to be discovered'.

"Then again, 100 years ago the panda was a mythological animal that hid in bamboo and killed people. I don't have any strong feelings. I just like the mystery of it."

During his several visits to the Everest region, he had heard "heaps of stories, third-hand" about the Yeti. One Himalayan map he had included a landmark highlighted with the phrase: "Yeti kills three yaks and attacks sherpa woman".

"There is also a sherpa who I have met a couple of times and he has three huge scars down the side of his face.

"Some people say he was attacked by a Yeti, other people say it was a bear.

"Privately, a lot of sherpas believe in the Yeti."

More information on Allsop's mission can be found on his website:

http://www.returnthehand.com/

Kiwi adventurer leads Yeti hunt

NEIL REID - Sunday News

Mike Allsop, who conquered Mt Everest three years ago, is searching for the skull and skeletal hand of what was said to be a mythical "Abominable Snowman".

The controversial artefacts were stolen from a monastery in the tiny Nepalese village of Pangboche, in the 1990s.

"I am hoping that the person who has them wants to give them back," Allsop told Sunday News. "I hope they will have an alert set up on their computer for whenever the artefacts are mentioned on the internet.

"I am offering... to go and reclaim them. I will go anywhere in the world in person, free of charge, no questions asked and I will also buy them a beer."

Weta Workshops has created life-sized replicas of the skull and hand to help searchers find the real things.

Allsop, 41, is an Air New Zealand pilot and was introduced to Weta boss Sir Richard Taylor by Air NZ chief executive Rob Fyfe.

Allsop will hand-deliver the replicas to the monastery when he and 17 Air NZ co-workers travel to Pangboche in April.

The original Pangboche hand and skull came to international prominence in the 1950s.

Texan adventurer and oil magnate Tom Slick photographed the items during one of his early missions to find the Yeti in 1957.

Two years later, one of Slick's team returned to the Pangboche monastery.

He reportedly drank Scotch with a monk until the local passed out, before stealing bone fragments from the hand. He then supposedly replaced the bones with those from a human hand, before rewrapping the Pangboche hand to disguise his theft.

The stolen fragments were allegedly smuggled back to America by a Hollywood star.

Then in 1999, the skull and what remained of the skeletal hand were stolen from the monastery.

Allsop, who scaled Mt Everest in 2007, was intrigued when he learned of the artefacts and determined to reclaim them for the monastery.

"These were very treasured artefacts," he said. "There was a huge outrage when they were stolen.

"The monks initially wouldn't show them to anyone, then slowly they showed them... unfortunately they showed them to one person too many."

Asked whether he believed in the existence of the Abominable Snowman, Allsop said: "A big part of me says, `Yes, the Yeti does exist'. Then the logical side goes, `Maybe it is a breed of bear or other type of animal which is yet to be discovered'.

"Then again, 100 years ago the panda was a mythological animal that hid in bamboo and killed people. I don't have any strong feelings. I just like the mystery of it."

During his several visits to the Everest region, he had heard "heaps of stories, third-hand" about the Yeti. One Himalayan map he had included a landmark highlighted with the phrase: "Yeti kills three yaks and attacks sherpa woman".

"There is also a sherpa who I have met a couple of times and he has three huge scars down the side of his face.

"Some people say he was attacked by a Yeti, other people say it was a bear.

"Privately, a lot of sherpas believe in the Yeti."

More information on Allsop's mission can be found on his website:

http://www.returnthehand.com/

'Indiana Jones' hits the Yeti trail in Nepal

Kathmandu, Oct 25 (IANS) As mysterious and as much sought-after as UFOs, the Yeti - also known as the Abominable Snowman, Migoi and Bigfoot - is not a myth or a hermit in the wilderness.

It exists in virginal forests untrodden by man, living on tree barks, frogs and even 'brains' of animals.

Immensely powerful, it can kill several yaks with a rock and when lonely, wistfully eyes the mountain women grazing their herds near the forest, toying with the idea of capturing one for company.

It has a strong sense of smell, is afraid of the fire and lives in caves.

The hairy ape man that has captured the imagination of people down the ages comes alive vividly once again as another 'Indiana Jones' hits the Yeti trail in Nepal with his new book, 'Yetis, Sasquatch and Hairy Giants'.

'I must be frank and say that I haven't come across a Yeti as yet though I went on several Yeti expeditions,' says a candid David Hatcher Childress, the 54-year-old explorer whose nearly 20 books on his exotic wanderings have made his fans bestow the title 'Indiana Jones' on him.

'However, I firmly believe they exist.'

The American archaeologist, who first came to Nepal in 1976 at the age of 19, has been to Mongolia, China, Bhutan, Sikkim and places in Canada where sightings of the mysterious creature were reported. His new book, published by Kathmandu's Adventure Pilgrims Trekking and launched in the capital Saturday, puts together a wealth of anecdotes, reports and photographs about the Yeti.

'One of the earliest reported sightings was in 1921 when a British expedition went on a reconnaissance of Mt Everest,' says Childress, on the eve of a trekking expedition in Nepal.

'They saw a group of shaggy creatures crossing the glacier and asked their Sherpa guides what they were. The guides answered it was the Mehteh Kangmi, meaning the Big Ape. When the expedition telegrammed their discovery, the message became garbled and people thought it was 'Metch' or wretched. And that's how the Abominable Snowman expression came into being.'

Childress also says the Yeti could be the inspiration for King Kong, the gigantic primordial beast made famous by the eponymous Hollywood film of 1933 directed by Peter Jackson.

'Kong could have been derived from Kangmi,' he says.

Three countries are most passionate about the Yeti, according to him - the US, Canada, where it is called the Bigfoot or Sasquatch, and Nepal.

However, the home of the Yeti is most likely to be in the mountains of Bhutan, Sikkim and the base of the Makalu peak in Nepal as well as Mt Kanchenjunga.

Two years before his first visit to Nepal, the world, he says, was rocked by reports about a Yeti incident in Nepal.

In July 1974, a Sherpa woman who had gone to the forests in Solukhumbu in northern Nepal to graze her herd of yaks reportedly came across the Yeti, an immense beast that struck the yaks on the neck with a rock and killed them.

It then reportedly split their skulls open and ate their brains, causing the woman to fall in a faint.

'When she recovered, she couldn't talk for several days due to the shock,' Childress says. 'That's how powerful the yeti is. It can tear a man from limb to limb. However, it prefers to avoid men.'

Two famed explorers hit the Yeti trail in Nepal much before Childress: the first man atop the Everest, Sir Edmund Hillary, who was part of a Yeti expedition in 1960 but discovered the Yeti skull to be that of a monkey, and Austrian climber Reinhold Messner, whose 1999 book, 'My quest for the Yeti', made him the target of ridicule.

Both later became disillusioned and concluded the Yeti did not exist.

In 2007, an American television channel specialising in extraordinary creatures came to look for the Yeti in Nepal.

Though they didn't find their elusive quarry, the crew returned content with casts made of unusually big footprints they had found.

Childress has already begun work on a second Yeti book. This one, he says, will focus on the Yeti in Nepal.

'Even now, scientists are working in Bhutan, trying to find more evidence and new hair samples that will prove the Yeti exists,' he says.

'The Yeti is real, not a myth or a bear or a wild man.'

'Indiana Jones' hits the Yeti trail in Nepal

Kathmandu, Oct 25 (IANS) As mysterious and as much sought-after as UFOs, the Yeti - also known as the Abominable Snowman, Migoi and Bigfoot - is not a myth or a hermit in the wilderness.

It exists in virginal forests untrodden by man, living on tree barks, frogs and even 'brains' of animals.

Immensely powerful, it can kill several yaks with a rock and when lonely, wistfully eyes the mountain women grazing their herds near the forest, toying with the idea of capturing one for company.

It has a strong sense of smell, is afraid of the fire and lives in caves.

The hairy ape man that has captured the imagination of people down the ages comes alive vividly once again as another 'Indiana Jones' hits the Yeti trail in Nepal with his new book, 'Yetis, Sasquatch and Hairy Giants'.

'I must be frank and say that I haven't come across a Yeti as yet though I went on several Yeti expeditions,' says a candid David Hatcher Childress, the 54-year-old explorer whose nearly 20 books on his exotic wanderings have made his fans bestow the title 'Indiana Jones' on him.

'However, I firmly believe they exist.'

The American archaeologist, who first came to Nepal in 1976 at the age of 19, has been to Mongolia, China, Bhutan, Sikkim and places in Canada where sightings of the mysterious creature were reported. His new book, published by Kathmandu's Adventure Pilgrims Trekking and launched in the capital Saturday, puts together a wealth of anecdotes, reports and photographs about the Yeti.

'One of the earliest reported sightings was in 1921 when a British expedition went on a reconnaissance of Mt Everest,' says Childress, on the eve of a trekking expedition in Nepal.

'They saw a group of shaggy creatures crossing the glacier and asked their Sherpa guides what they were. The guides answered it was the Mehteh Kangmi, meaning the Big Ape. When the expedition telegrammed their discovery, the message became garbled and people thought it was 'Metch' or wretched. And that's how the Abominable Snowman expression came into being.'

Childress also says the Yeti could be the inspiration for King Kong, the gigantic primordial beast made famous by the eponymous Hollywood film of 1933 directed by Peter Jackson.

'Kong could have been derived from Kangmi,' he says.

Three countries are most passionate about the Yeti, according to him - the US, Canada, where it is called the Bigfoot or Sasquatch, and Nepal.

However, the home of the Yeti is most likely to be in the mountains of Bhutan, Sikkim and the base of the Makalu peak in Nepal as well as Mt Kanchenjunga.

Two years before his first visit to Nepal, the world, he says, was rocked by reports about a Yeti incident in Nepal.

In July 1974, a Sherpa woman who had gone to the forests in Solukhumbu in northern Nepal to graze her herd of yaks reportedly came across the Yeti, an immense beast that struck the yaks on the neck with a rock and killed them.

It then reportedly split their skulls open and ate their brains, causing the woman to fall in a faint.

'When she recovered, she couldn't talk for several days due to the shock,' Childress says. 'That's how powerful the yeti is. It can tear a man from limb to limb. However, it prefers to avoid men.'

Two famed explorers hit the Yeti trail in Nepal much before Childress: the first man atop the Everest, Sir Edmund Hillary, who was part of a Yeti expedition in 1960 but discovered the Yeti skull to be that of a monkey, and Austrian climber Reinhold Messner, whose 1999 book, 'My quest for the Yeti', made him the target of ridicule.

Both later became disillusioned and concluded the Yeti did not exist.

In 2007, an American television channel specialising in extraordinary creatures came to look for the Yeti in Nepal.

Though they didn't find their elusive quarry, the crew returned content with casts made of unusually big footprints they had found.

Childress has already begun work on a second Yeti book. This one, he says, will focus on the Yeti in Nepal.

'Even now, scientists are working in Bhutan, trying to find more evidence and new hair samples that will prove the Yeti exists,' he says.

'The Yeti is real, not a myth or a bear or a wild man.'

Zoo opens 'honeymoon suite' for rhinos

Nepal officials hope to persuade the endangered pair to breed for the first time
By AFP
Published Friday, August 13, 2010

Nepal's only zoo has opened a new "honeymoon suite" for its two one-horned rhinos in the hope of persuading the endangered pair to breed for the first time.

Kancha, 20, and 22-year-old Kanchi have lived together in captivity for most of their adult lives, but have never bred - something the zoo's manager Sarita Jnawali attributes to the quality of their enclosure.

She hopes that their new, much larger home, which features mud rather than concrete floors and two large ponds for them to wallow in, will persuade them to finally start mating.

"As far as we can tell, Kancha and Kanchi have never mated," Jnawali told AFP on Friday.

"Before, we didn't have the proper facilities for the rhinos to breed, and we hope this new enclosure will help us to increase species numbers."

Thousands of one-horned rhinos once roamed the plains of Nepal and northern India, but their numbers have dwindled in recent decades as they have fallen victim to poaching and human encroachment on their habitat.

The animal's horn is highly valued as an aphrodisiac in China, and a single one can fetch as much as $14,000 on the international black market.

Experts say Nepal's rhino population fell dramatically during the 10-year Maoist rebellion that ended in 2006, as army guards stationed in wildlife reserves to deter poachers left to fight the rebels.

Only around 435 remain in Nepal, Jnawali said.

Nepal's zoo relies solely on a 50-rupee (67-cent) entry charge for funding, and a local bank that uses the one-horned rhino as its logo covered the 1.5 million rupee cost of the new enclosure.

Ace Development Bank chief executive Siddhant Raj Pandey has dubbed the new enclosure the rhino "honeymoon suite".

"We learned that the reason these two had not bred was their environment so we decided to build them a new enclosure," he told AFP. "We understand there are signs of them becoming quite amorous."

http://www.emirates247.com/offbeat/crazy-world/zoo-opens-honeymoon-suite-for-rhinos-2010-08-13-1.278523