Abstract
Ahmadabad and its surrounding region (Gujarat, India) is an important breeding area for the Critically Endangered White-rumped Vulture Gyps bengalensis, currently with around 60 breeding pairs. The kite flying festival, celebrated on 14 and 15 January, poses a major threat to the vulture. Through rigorous awareness and rescue programs we encountered 108 White-rumped Vultures between January 2009 and August 2012. The vultures were injured due to kite flying (43.9%) and other causes, such as dehydration, visceral gout and illness (56.1%). Considering all encounters, survival rates were higher among vultures with kite string injuries (53.3%) when compared to other causes (36.7%). This was due to a higher proportion of dead-on-arrival encounters in other causes (45.0%) especially when compared to encounters with visceral gout and kite string injuries (2.2%). The survival rates of encounters of live rescued vultures are higher in other causes (66.7%) compared to kite string injuries (54.5%). This is mainly because the majority of live encounters (excluding kite string injuries) are dehydrated fledglings or juveniles which recover well upon administration of intravenous fluids. Encounters of live vultures with kite string injuries involve birds with severe blood loss, incurable infections and stress which result in decreased survival. Most casualties from kite string injuries are due to hypovolumic shock, septic shock and stress.
Highlights
We examined 66 species of fishes during an ichthyofaunal diversity survey of Bhutan in 2011 and provide an annotated checklist of the freshwater fish species known to occur in Bhutan
In comparison to the 520 species reported from the eastern Himalayan region (Allen et al 2010), 213 from the Arunachal Pradesh in northeastern India (Bagra et al 2009), and 296 species from northeastern India (Vishwanath et al 2007) the number of fish species currently known from Bhutan is a gross underestimate
As the survey was carried out mainly in the monsoon season, a more extensive sampling regime both temporally and geographically is necessary to gain a better understanding of the freshwater fish diversity of Bhutan
Summary
We examined 66 species of fishes during an ichthyofaunal diversity survey of Bhutan in 2011 and provide an annotated checklist of the freshwater fish species known to occur in Bhutan. A total of 91 species are known from Bhutan, but this is clearly a gross underestimate of the true freshwater fish diversity of the country. This highlights the need for more extensive freshwater fish surveys to be carried out in the country. The most comprehensive listings of the freshwater fishes of Bhutan till date by Dubey (1978), Dhendup & Boyd (1994), and Petr (1999) record 47 species, of which eight are alien. Given our poor knowledge of Bhutanese ichthyofaunal diversity and the imminent threats to aquatic biodiversity arising from large hydropower
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