A caretaker feeds animals at the deer park in Cuttack. Picture by Badrika Nath Das

Cuttack, May 14: The municipal corporation will re-install temporary barricades to segregate animals inside the city’s sole deer park at Madhusudanagar.

The move came after the Cuttack Municipal Corporation had drawn flak for its failure to check overcrowding of animals at the park.

A senior civic body official said a joint inspection by officials of the forest department and corporation engineers was conducted last month.

Moreover, according to the experts’ recommendation, it has been decided to put up temporary barricades to segregate male and female deer by next week. At present, the deer park that is spread over two acres houses nearly 165 animals.

Phailin that had hit the state on October 12 last year destroyed the barricades, while no steps were taken to segregate the animals by the civic body.

Besides, the corporation will also chalk out a development plan, including that for plantations inside the deer park, as bulk of the trees have also been damaged in the cyclone.

The proposal is likely to be passed in the corporation’s first council meeting to be held after the counting of votes on May 16.

“There is an urgent need of plantation as many trees have been damaged, while temporary rest sheds have been put up to protect the animals from the heat. Such measures remain inadequate as the animals prefer natural shed of the trees,” said Tulasipur resident Umesh Barik.

Corporation commissioner Gyanaranjan Das said adequate steps had been taken to protect the animals from the heatwave prevailing in the city in the past couple of weeks.

According to the traditional contingency plan that have been followed for the past two years, the deer are being fed with water-rich fruits, including watermelon, cucumber, cabbage and other green vegetables.

Usually, 1,200 grams of deer feed is provided to each adult, while 300 grams of feed is prescribed for fawns on a daily basis. An extra 45kg of water-rich fruits is now being provided to the animals at the park.

“To protect the animals from dehydration, we are providing 500 grams of glucose to the deer on a daily basis, while four water sprinklers have been installed,” said park caretaker Siba Prasad Mishra.

Mishra said manual sprinkling of water on the six temporary rest sheds was also being done while water was being sprinkled on the entire ground to minimise the heat radiation.