App to record wild animals cited on streets during lockdown

Hyderabad: Amidst the coronavirus lockdown, people have been spotting wild animals roaming the streets. Recently a civet was spotted in Kerala’s Kozhikode.

To keep a record of such instances the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) has launched an app in which common people can record the instance if they spot an animal in their locality.

Bilal Habeeb from the WII who developed the app told NewsMeter, “We aim to collect a database of all the animals recorded outside the forest during lockdown. Through this we will be able to check which species and how many species were cited and recorded the maximum. The app also lets us know which animal was cited the maximum number of times in south India etc.”

The English version of the app is currently available at WII website. “We are currently asking the forest officials to download the app as they may be more aware about such incidences. But we also requesting the common people to download the app and share details of animals cited by them,” Mr Habeeb said

Explaining how the app works, he said once the app is installed and the person registers, he or she can upload pictures of wild animals with their name. The app has the ability to take location and time by itself.

The app in its introductory page clearly states, “Kindly report the incidents which you come across only while performing your daily duties or from the safety of your home and don’t make special efforts to gather this information breaking the lockdown.”

Hyderabad’s Vata foundation is also going to be part of this project. It’s founder Uday Krishna said, “We are helping the WII with a Hindi and Telugu version of this app.”