On anvil, biodiversity mapping of Byculla Zoo………Nitya Kaushik
In a move that will hearten the citys environmentalists, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will conduct an intensive biodiversity mapping of the Byculla Zoo to identify the varieties of trees and other flora on the premises, using GPS.
The 53-acre Byculla zoo, which is in the middle of a Rs 433-crore makeover, has been stuck in a limbo for nearly a year, after the Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee (MHCC) decided to hold back its final approval until it was convinced that the green cover of the zoo would be retained.
After days of haggling over the botanical status of the zoo, the decision was taken by Additional Municipal Commissioner Aseem Gupta on Tuesday following a meeting with botanist Dr Marselin R Almeida.
The MHCC has been rightly concerned that the characteristic of the zoo as a botanical garden would be lost during the makeover. As per their recommendation, we organised a trip with Dr Almeida today. During our visit, we learnt that zoo is home to several species of plants, shrubs, herbs, climbers other than trees which will be identified and documented so that they are not lost during the makeover. Dr Almeida has advised us to map the biodiversity of the zoo and document all the species, Gupta said.
The mapping, which will begin on Friday, will be completed by August 15. The plan is to put the specific location of the zoos flora on a map so that we can refer to the species, their location and count any time in the future, said zoo director A M Anjankar.
Anjankar said while the garden department has conducted a tree survey in the zoo, it could not identified as many as 50 species correctly.
The mapping will put the plants of the zoo in an actual map and would therefore help us locate each plant when desired. This will help us make sure there is presence of all species during the makeover. We have conducted similar surveys in Nashik and Ahmednagar and they are very usful for futrue reference too, said Dr Almeida who has worked with the Bombay Natural History Society, the Blatter Herbarium of St. Xaviers College, the Sanjay Gandhi National Park and the ISTAM in the past.