Sri Biligiriranganathaswamy Tiger Reserve in Chamarajanagar district has inducted a new member to shore up the task of forest protection and anti-poaching activities.

Jhansi, a new sniffer dog, reached BRT Tiger Reserve on Thursday after completing seven months of rigorous training.

The sniffer dog was trained at Chandigarh by the Indo-Tibetan Border Police and the exercise was supported by Traffic India, a division of WWF India, and works closely with various State Governments and agencies to study, monitor and curb wildlife trade which is illegal.

Jhansi displayed its skills and its capacity to obey various commands in a brief demonstration. Forest guard Basavaraj and forest watcher Siddharamanna were trained to handle it.

Senior officials in BRT said Jhansi will be attached to the Punjur range and will be further trained to detect wildlife cases. The tiger reserve is part of the Nagarahole-Bandipur-Wayanad-Mudumalai-Satyamangalam-BRT complex that has a contiguous forest cover spread over 12,134 sq km with an estimated tiger population ranging from 635 to 813, according to the National Tiger Conservation Authority.

The other species recorded in the BRT include leopard, elephant, bear, dholes or wild dogs besides various prey animals like spotted deer, sambar, gaur, wild boars etc and the landscape shares borders with Satyamangala Wildlife Sanctuary in the neighbouring State of Tamil Nadu.