ZSI discovers new animal species
Kolkata: The Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) has discovered as many as 300 species that are new to science and 174 new records of animals. The entire findings has been compiled in a book titled Animal Discoveries – 2017 that has been released by ZSI recently.
It may be mentioned that among these -104 newly discovered species and 72 species of new records to India are the contributions of scientists and researchers of ZSI.
The species new to science includes 249 invertebrates and 51 vertebrates that have been added as newly described species from the country.
The number of vertebrates discovered includes 27 species of fish, 18 of amphibians and 12 of reptiles.
The highlight of the animal discoveries is a new fossil reptilian species — Shringasaurus Indicus — recorded by scientists of the Kolkata-based Indian Statistical Institute. The important discoveries include a frog species, Nasikabatrachus bhupathi with snout-shaped nose like a pig and named after Indian herpetologist S Bhupathy; and a snake, Rhabdops aquaticus, discovered from the northern Western Ghats and deriving its name from the Latin word for water in reference to its presence in
freshwater bodies.
"The new discoveries and additional new species are indicative of the nation's rich animal diversity and also the ever increasing values of our biodiversity as they symbolise additional biological resource materials for our use in the fields of genetic engineering and biotechnology," ZSI director Kailash Chandra said. It may be mentioned that India has only 2.4 percent of the global land cover, but harbours about 7 percent of the species known from the world, with as many as 1,01,167 animal species known from its land and marine jurisdictional limits.
"We are committed to the task of conducting exploratory surveys for faunal sample collections and data from the diverse biodiversity zones, ecosystems and protected areas of the country for inventorying and monitoring the status of Indian faunal diversity. We are also responsible for assessing their threat status for conservation and management actions," a senior ZSI official said.
