Sahyadri-Panchganga Tiger Corridor: Forest Ecology

Aurangabad district's hilly eastern areas form the northern edge of the Sahyadri tiger conservation landscape, with forest patches connecting to the larger tiger populations of the Western Ghats. The dry deciduous forests in Aurangabad's Kannad and Vaijapur talukas provide habitat for leopard, hyena, wolf, and numerous smaller species. The Godavari river corridor serves as a wildlife movement route through otherwise agricultural terrain. Sacred groves (devrai) maintained by communities around village deities preserve biodiversity nuclei within the agricultural matrix. Traditional Bhill and Gond communities in Aurangabad's forest areas have customary knowledge of animal behaviour used for sustainable forest resource management. The connection between Aurangabad's hill forests and Melghat Tiger Reserve to the north (via the Purna river corridor) is ecologically important and is being mapped by Wildlife Institute of India for landscape-level tiger connectivity planning.