Hump-backed Mahseer

Mains Paper 3: Environment | Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment

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Prelims Level: Hump-backed Mahseer

Mains Level: Read the attached story

The hump-backed Mahseer, found in the waters of the Cauvery, has been added to the IUCN Red List with Critically Endangered Status.

Hump-backed Mahseer

The hump-backed mahseer is a large freshwater fish also called the tiger of the water and found only in the Cauvery river basin including Kerala’s Pambar, Kabini and Bhavani rivers.
It is now “Critically Endangered”: more threatened than the tiger is, as per the IUCN’s Red List of Threatened Species.
The fish is one of the 229 species added to the Red List last November; this update also reveals that the threat status of 12 other Indian species, including great hornbills, has increased.
The inclusion was possible only once the fish got its scientific name last June—Tor remadevii.

5 other species added

Five other species have also made it to threatened categories: two wild orchids, the Arabian scad (a marine fish) and two wild coffee species found only in a few localities in the Western Ghats.

More threats to Hornbill

The great hornbill was earlier categorised as “Near Threatened”.
It is now “Vulnerable” due to high hunting pressure coupled with habitat loss and deforestation, while the wreathed hornbill has moved from “Least Concern” to “Vulnerable”.

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