Chilka lake gears up to provide protection to winged visitors

With winter approaching and migratory birds set to arrive on the swamps of Chilka lake in Odisha, the wildlife wing of India's largest brackish lake is gearing up to provide protection to the winged guests when they start to flock in the blue lagoon.
"We will set up 18 temporary camps in the lake from this week and intensify patrolling around the lake to prevent poaching of migratory birds," said divisional forest officer, Chilka, Bikash Ranjan Das.
The wildlife department will engage 60 people for the next six months and hire at least 10 boats for patrolling on the lake apart from the existing eight boats already in operation, Das said.

The camps will be run till March, next year when the migratory birds set off homeward. He added that the arrival of migratory birds is likely to be delayed as compared to the previous year due to continuous rain for the last few days.
"We have spotted very few migratory birds at Nalabana (the bird sanctuary in the lake)," he said.
Last winter around 8.86 lakh birds of 161 different species had visited the lagoon. The lake attracts winged guests from far off Caspian Sea, Lake Baikal, remote parts of Russia, central and South East Asia, Ladakh and Himalayas every winter, officials said.