Local name: Para ( Urdu )

Description and Biology:

Size:Shoulder Height: over 2 feet

Weight: 75 to 120 lbs

Description: The Hog deer is a close relative of the Axis deer or Chital, which is now extinct in Pakistan, but is found in neighbouring India. Adult Hog deers have a brown coat that gets darker in winter. Though spotted with indistinct spots, hog deer don’t have as bright and conspicuous spots as spotted deer (chital) do. The older hog deers get, dimmer the spots become. Hog deers have slender, three-tined antlers rising from bony pedicals; the browline making acute angles with the main beam.

Reproduction: The peak of rut season comes during the monsoon and the hind gives birth to one calf at a time

Social Behavior: This species of deer is marked by thick set-appearance and peculiar gait. Reminiscent of the pig, as their name suggests, hog deer are a strange kind of deer that run with the heads down and at times collide with other fellow deers. They prefer to creash shurbs and undergrowth rather than jumping over them as other deers. Hog deer are particularly found fewer in group, but on occasions they can be seen in herds of ten or more. do.

Diet: Being predominantly grazers, they prefer short grasslands nearby riverbankds and swamps. (all above information from Shangri La home page).

Habitat and Distribution:

The Hog deer’s prefered habitat is grasslands or swamps near rivers. In Pakistan it is mainly found in Riverian forests of river Indus in Lower Sind. The Hog deer is found in the east Nara and the indus delta forests in the extreme south of Sind. Due to the controlling of river Indus by building dams and barrages the habitat of Hog deer has greatly been reduced to one or two pockets. It is also hunted extensively by hunters and the local people. The result is that it has become extremly rare and is now on the verge of extinction.