Evaluation of Suitable Habitat for Wild Boar (Sus scrofa) in Pench Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh, India

Habitat assessment is the primary task to ensure in-situ conservation of any species for its better management. We modeled habitat suitability of wild pig (Sus scrofa) in Pench Tiger Reserve (PTR) using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) technique in GIS environment. Land Use Land Cover (LULC) map derived from Landsat 8 data along with other secondary inputs viz. topography and administrative coverage of the reserve were used as inputs in the model. Field experience and expert’s comments are considered for assigning the final weightages to layers. The model revealed that a significant area of the reserve is suitable for the wild pig as they are generalist in nature. Our result revealed that wild pig prefers the areas which are close to the human habitat. This study also incorporates that remote sensing and GIS are a very important tool for wildlife habitat modeling with minimum efforts and low budget.