Wildlife of North-West Frontier Province

The North-West Frontier Province is one of the four provinces of Pakistan, which lies between 31o 4’ and 36o 57’ N. latitude and 61o 16’ and 74o 07’ E. longitude. The province is bounded by Afghanistan in the North and West; parts of Baluchistan and Punjab provinces in the South; and Gilgit, Kashmir and the Province of Punjab in the East. It extends over an area of 74521 sq. km and has a population of about 22 million.

NWFP has a great topographic diversity. It has vast plains, broken lands, low hills, and high mountains of Himalaya-Karakorum, Hindukush and Koh Safaid and Suleiman ranges. The altitude varies from 300 m at Dera Isamil Khan in the South to about 8000 m at Mount Tirchmir in the North, which comprise10 wildlife habitat having diverse climatic and topographic variation which supports important fauna of the country.

The mammalian fauna of Pakistan is composed of Palearctic and Indo-Malayan forms with some affinities to Ethiopian regions. The NWFP supports 94 species of mammals out of total 158 species found in Pakistan. Three of the six species endemic to Pakistan (Whooly flying squirrel, Murree Vole, and Indus River Dolphin) are also found in NWFP.

Avian fauna of Pakistan is of diverse origin. Breeding birds are mainly a mixture of Palearctic and Indo-Malayan forms. Whereas, Sino-Malayan and Sino-Himalayan forms are also present. NWFP has 453 birds’ species out of total 660 birds species present in Pakistan.

There are 42 species of reptiles out of 174 species of reptiles present in Pakistan. Important wildlife species include Snow leopard, Markhor, Ibex, Rhesus monkey, Red fox, Common leopard, wolf, brown bear, black bear, musk dear, goral, barking dear, Urial, Hog dear, and Chinkar gazelle. Among important wildlife bird species are Monal pheasant, tragopan pheasant, koklass pheasant, kalij pheasant, and Cheer pheasant, falcon species, Himalayan Griffen vulture, grey partridge, black partridge, chukar partridge, common crane, and demoiselle crane.

There are 5 national parks, 36 public game reserves, 52 community game reserves, 21 private game reserves, 2 wildlife sanctuaries, 3 wildlife refuges, and 5 wildlife parks, covering 11% of the land of the province. There is Asia’s largest pheasantry which house 38 pheasant species of the world, as well as 5 avian display centers in the province which help imparting awareness and education among general masses.

Important Wildlife species of the province such as Indus Dolphin, snow leopard, straight horned markhor, western horned tragopan, cheer pheasant and Asian Cobra are included in IUCN endangered species list.