Our Correspondent
Kohima | October 22
As part of augmenting wildlife conservation efforts in Nagaland, a football veteran Roko Angami today donated a monitor lizard to the state’s wildlife division here.
Roko donated the same to the wildlife division officials in the premises of Blyth’s Tragopan Conservation & Breeding Centre, Kohima.
He informed that he found the monitor, weighing around 2-and-half kg and 3.4 feet long from his RK Farm, Zhadima under Kohima district.
After receiving the species, Kiukhenshi S Yimchunger, Forester- I Kohima said the species will be handed over to Nagaland Zoological Park, Rangapahar Dimapur in a day or two.
Kiukhenshi appreciated Roko for coming forward voluntarily to donate the same, thereby strengthening the wildlife conservation efforts in Nagaland. Earlier this year on July 28, Roko along with Seyiekhrielie Rio, BDO Chiephobozou also donated an eight-foot-long Python snake to the wildlife division.
Also acknowledging other donors as well, she expressed happiness that people have started realizing the importance of conserving the wildlife.
She looks forward the continuous support of the community towards wildlife conservation in the state. Roko expressed his desire to donate more in the coming days as well in order to stay connected with the wildlife conservation mission.
According to entries in the encyclopedia.com, the monitor lizards include 60 living species of large lizards in the genus Varanus, family Varanidae. They inhabit tropical and subtropical regions of Africa, Asia, and Australia.
The largest species of monitor, and the world’s largest lizard is the Komodo dragon (Varanus komodoensis), which can achieve a length of 9.8 ft (3 m) and a weight of 300 lb (135 kg). It is an endangered species, occurring only on a few, small Indonesian islands. An even larger monitor lizard, known as Megalania, was about twice as long as the Komodo dragon and is known from fossils collected in Australia. The smallest species is the short-tailed monitor (Varanus brevicauda) of Western Australia, only 7.9 inches (20 cm) long and weighing 0.7 oz (20 g).
