Our Professors :-
- Dr. Sibani Manna, M.Sc., Ph.D.,
- Dr. Swapan Kumar Das, M.Sc., Ph.D.
- Dr. Shukla Mukherjee, M.Sc. Ph.D.
- Dr. Mohua Guha, M.Sc.
- Shampa Sarkar, M.Sc.
- Saswati Biswas, M.Sc. (Part-time)
The Zoological Educational Tour to kolkata Alipur Zoo & Indian Museum, was organised by our Zoology Dept. with the 2nd year Bio Science ( Zoology General) student in 9th March' 2011, as per syllabus of Zoology, new regulation B.sc (1+1+1) of Calcutta University. The Team was guided by our respected and beloved prof. Dr. Swapan Kumar Das, Prof. Dr. Sibani Manna, Prof. Saswati Biswas, Prof. Dr. Mohua Guha, Prof. Dr. Shukla Mukherjee & our Support staff Sri Prasanta Ghosh.
In the Morning of 9th March we reached at the 1st Gate of Alipur Zoo,kolkata, as per the direction of our respected prof. After that we entered in the Zoo premises in guidence of the prof. Ultimately we were divided into 4 teams & we started our servey about the animals of the zoo and we noted the various details of them in our notebook, and we took their snapshot. Lastly we took rest.
Lastly we reached at Indian Museum, kolkata in the reserved bus. We entered in the museum through the 1st gate, here also we were divided into 4 teams and as per the direction of our prof. we collected the various details of the important animals,insects,fossils and skeleton, and we also took their snapshot. Near about 5 pm our educational tour was over, and we returned home.
Few Information About Zoological Garden:-
The Alipore Zoological Gardens (also informally called the Alipore Zoo, Calcutta Zoo or Kolkata Zoo) is India's oldest formally stated zoological park (as opposed to royal and British menageries) and a big tourist attraction in Kolkata, West Bengal. It has been open as a zoo since 1876, and covers 45 acres (18 ha). It is probably best known as the home of the now expired Aldabra Giant Tortoise Adwaita, which was reputed to have been over 250 years old when it died. It is also home to one of the few captive breeding projects involving the Manipur Brow-antlered Deer. The zoo has drawn a lot of criticism from the zoo community and conservationists in the past few decades, mainly for its cramped cages, as well as for its Panthera hybrid breeding program.
A 4-month-old female baby elephant, deserted by her family, has been raised and contented to be the newest member of the zoo. She has been named 'Baby'.
The zoo had its roots in a private menagerie established by Governor General of Bengal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington established around 1800 in his summer home at Barrackpore near Kolkata, as part of the Indian Natural History Project. However, Wellesley returned to England with his brother Richard Wellesley - then Governor General of India, and the animals were then looked after by the famous Scottish physician zoologist Francis Buchanan-Hamilton. The collection from this era are documented by watercolours by Charles D'Oyly, and a visit by the famous French botanist Victor Jacquemont. Sir Stamford Raffles visited the menagerie in 1810, encountering his first tapir there, and doubtless used some aspects of the menagerie as an inspiration for the London Zoo.
The foundation of zoos in major cities around the world caused a growing thought among the British community in Kolkata that the menagerie should be upgraded to a formal zoological garden. Credence to such arguments was lent by an article in the now-defunct Calcutta Journal of Natural History's July 1841 issue. In 1873, the Lieutenant-Governor Sir Richard Temple formally proposed the formation of a zoo in Kolkata, and the Government finally allotted land for the zoo based on to the joint petition of the Asiatic Society and Agri-Horticultural Society.
The zoo was formally opened in Alipore - a posh Kolkata suburb, and inaugurated on 1 January 1876 by Edward VII, then Prince of Wales. (Some reports place the inauguration on an alternate date of 27 December 1875). The initial stock consisted of the private menagerie of Carl Louis Schwendler (1838 – 1882), a German electrician who was posted in India for a feasibility study of electrically lighting Indian Railway stations. Gifts were also accepted from the general public. The initial collection consisted of the following animals:
African Buffalo, Zanzibar Ram, Domestic sheep, Four-horned sheep, Hybrid Kashmiri Goat, Indian Antelope, Indian Gazelle, Sambar Deer, Spotted Deer and Hog Deer
It grew based on gifts from British and Indian nobility - like Raja Suryakanta Acharya of Mymensingh in whose honour the open air tiger enclosure is named the Mymensingh Enclosure. Other contributors who donated part or all of their private menagerie to the Alipore Zoo included the Maharaja of Mysore Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV.
The park was initially run by an honorary managing committee which included Schwendler and the famous botanist George King. The first Indian superintendent of the zoo was Ram Brahma Sanyal, who did much to improve the standing of the Alipore Zoo and achieved good captive breeding success in an era when such initiatives were rarely heard of. One such success story of the zoo was a live birth of the rare Sumatran Rhinoceros in 1889. The next pregnancy in captivity occurred at the Cincinnati Zoo in 1997, but ended with a miscarriage. Cincinnati Zoo finally recorded a live birth in 2001. Alipore Zoo was a pioneer among zoos in the 19th century and the early part of the 20th century under Sanyal, who published the first handbook on captive animal keeping. The zoo had an unusually high scientific standard for its time, and the record of the Cladotaenia genus (Cohn, 1901) of parasites are based upon cestodes (flatworm) found in an Australian bird that died at the zoo.
Attractions:- The zoo remains one of the most popular winter tourist attractions in Kolkata, but revenue earned is low as gate costs are highly subsidized. The ticket prices at the gate increased from Rs 5 to Rs 10 in the winter of 2003 (a doubling from approx. 12 c to 25 c in the exchange rate of the time). The footfall figures in 2005 showed an annual visitation of almost 20 lakh (2,000,000) — more than any other tourist attraction in Kolkata, and a peak of over 25,000 on Christmas Day and New Year's Day.
The zoo displays a large number of crowd-pulling megafauna, including the Royal Bengal Tiger, African Lion, Jaguar, Hippopotamus, Great Indian One-horned Rhinoceros, Reticulated Giraffe, Grant's Zebra, Emu, Dromedary Camel and Indian Elephant. Previously, other megafauna like the Panthera hybrids and the Giant Eland were present.
The zoo sported a large collection of attractive birds, including some threatened species up until the 1980s - large parrots including a number of Macaw species, Conures, lories and lorikeets; other large birds like Touracos and Hornbills; colourful game birds like the Golden Pheasant, Lady Amherst's Pheasant and Swinhoe's Pheasant and some large flightless birds like the Emu, Cassowary and Ostrich. However, lack of pairing and exchange programs have caused a significant decline in the populations, causing some of the populations to die out.
Ecological significance of the zoo grounds:- The zoo is also on the flyway for several migratory birds like the Sarus Crane, and sports a sizable wetland inside the zoo grounds. Since the zoo is enveloped by urban settlements for miles, the zoo wetlands are the only resting spot for some of the birds and are a focus of conservationists in Kolkata. However, the number of migratory bird visiting the zoo dropped from documented highs by over 40% in the winter of 2004–2005. Experts attribute the causes of the decline to increased pollution, new construction of highrises in the area, increasing threats in the summer grounds of the birds and declining quality of the water bodies at the zoo.
A rare photograph of R. B. Sanyal, the first superintendent of the zoo:-
Picture of the Zoo:-
An Educational Team With Prof.
Another Educational Team With Prof.
Another Educational Team With Prof.
The Peacock
The Elephant
Hill Mayna
Openbill Stork
Brow Antlered Deer
Sloth Bear
Common IguanaFew Information About Indian Museum:-
The ninth oldest regular museum of the world, INDIAN MUSEUM, Kolkata, INDIA is the oldest institution of its kind in Asia Pacific region and repository of the largest museum objects in India.
The Indian Museum (Bengali: à¦ারতীয় জাদুঘর) is the largest museum in India and has rare collections of antiques, armour and ornaments, fossils, skeletons, mummies, and Mughal paintings. It was founded by Dr Nathaniel Wallich a Danish botanist at Serampore (originally called Frederischnagore) near Kolkata (Calcutta), India, in 1814. It has six sections comprising thirty five galleries of cultural and scientific artifacts namely Art, Archaeology, Anthropology, Geology, Zoology and Economic Botany. This multipurpose Institution with multidisciplinary activities is being included as an Institute of national importance in the seventh schedule of the Constitution of India. It is one of oldest museums in the world. This is an autonomous organization under Ministry of Culture, Government of India.It is believed that some of the remaining fragmented pieces of the Singapore Stone, can still be found there.A multipurpose and multi disciplinary institution of national importance, the Museum was established at the Asiatic Society, the earliest learned body in the country on 2nd February 1814. Transferred to the present building in 1878 with two galleries, the Museum has now over sixty galleries of Art, Archaeology, Anthropology, Geology, Zoology and Botany sections, spreading over ten thousand square feet area. Many rare specimens both Indian and Trans - Indian origin relating to Humanities and Natural Science are preserved and displayed in the galleries of these sections. The administrative control of the cultural sections, viz Art, Archaeology and Anthropology rests with the Board of Trustees under its Directorate, and that of the three scientific sections is with Geological Survey of India, Zoological Survey of India and Botanical Survey of India.
Collections:- It currently (2009) occupies a resplendent mansion, and exhibits among others: an Egyptian mummy, the Buddhist stupa from Bharhut, the Buddha's ashes, the Ashoka pillar, whose three-lion symbol became the official emblem of the Republic of India, fossil skeletons of prehistoric animals like dinosaurs, an art collection, rare antiques, and a collection of meteorites.
Picture's of Indian Museum:-
Indian Museum
Premises of Indian Museum
Varities of Reptiles
The Crocodile & the getting ornaments in its stomach
The Sea Horse
The Mummy
We ruturn home with a lot of knowledge about our known animals from the Zoo & the Indian Museum. Its a great rememberence in our life.We are very grateful to our prof. & supporting staff, without their help & co-operation it was not possible.
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