Bhubaneswar: The three-day annual dolphin census commenced on Tuesday in Odisha’s Chilika, considered Asia’s biggest brackish water lagoon.
To carry out the mammoth exercise with accuracy, over 100 persons, including experts, retired forest officers, wildlife activists and forest staff, have been engaged. The census operation is being conducted by the Chilika Wildlife Division, with support of the Chilika Development Authority (CDA).
As many as 18 teams have been formed, with each consisting of five to six persons, to conduct the census across the 1,165-sq-km lake. While eight teams are deployed in Satapada, 10 teams have been engaged in Balugaon range, said Divisional Forest Officer Amlan Nayak.
As the weather conditions were conducive, almost all teams started their work from 6 am, and it continued till 12 noon on the first day.
The enumerators have been equipped with drone cameras, GPS units, range finders, binoculars, cameras and depth measurement instruments to record the sightings of the dolphins following the line-transect method, officials said.
They were given training for the exercises at Chandrapur near Barkul and Satapada on Monday.
The DFO said boat services for tourists on the lake will remain suspended in the morning hours till Thursday to avoid disturbance during the census exercise.
Spread across Ganjam, Khurda and Puri districts, Chilika, well-known as the country’s biggest waterfowl habitat, is home to two dolphin species.
The 2025 census revealed that there were 174 dolphins in the lake. There were 159 Irrawaddy dolphins and 15 of the Bottlenose species.
Apart from Chilika, the dolphin census is also being conducted in parts of the state’s coast, officials said.
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