CHIRUS: REVERSE MIGRATION

Tibetan antelopes known as Chiru, famous for shahtoosh wools are traveling again. This time in the winter for mating. They traverse hundreds of kilometers for rearing their calves in summer. Tibetan antelopes are typically polygamous. Male Tibetan antelopes chase, fight, shout and kick their front legs to get their brides. They even keep harems.

Chiru is a medium- sized bovid native to the north-eastern Tibetan plateau. Most of the population live within the Chinese border, while some scatter across Kashmir and Bhutan. They live in the harshest of cold environments in the allude. The soft underfur saves them from such extreme cold. The antelope has been hunted down specifically for this unique fur, and their numbers have dropped from nearly a million at the turn of the 20th century to fewer than 75,000 by its end. This led to the antelope now being listed as an endangered species and given the highest possible level of legal protection, whereby no commercial trade in shahtoosh is permitted. Since the start of the 21st century, strong conservation efforts have resulted in significant population recovery, with an estimated 150,000 living by 2010. The International Union for Conservation of Nature now classifies the antelope as “Near Threatened”.

Chirus were hunted for their extremely soft, light and warm underfur which is usually obtained after death. This underfur, known as shahtoosh is used to weave luxury shawls. It takes the underfur of three to five adult antelopes to make one shawl and costs around 20,000 $ (about 15 lakh rupees). Now banned shawls are extremely light, soft, worm and even can pass through a ring.

The animals are gregarious, sometimes congregating in herds hundreds strong when moving between summer and winter pastures, although they are more usually found in much smaller groups, with no more than 20 individuals. The females migrate up to 300 km every year to calving grounds in the summer, where they usually give birth to a single calf, and re-join the males at the wintering grounds in late autumn. The rutting season lasts from November to December.

Mothers give birth to a single calf in June or July, after a gestation period of about six months. The calves are precocial, being able to stand within 15 minutes of birth. They are fully grown within 15 months. Although females may remain with their mothers until they themselves give birth, males leave within 12 months, by which time their horns are beginning to grow.

Source: Himalayan News Chronicle