Occurrence records of mammals from the Western Ghats (primarily Sakleshpur, Anamalais and Nilgiris, India) between November 2023 and February 2026

Occurrence Observation
Latest version published by Nature Conservation Foundation on Mar 10, 2026 Nature Conservation Foundation
Publication date:
March 10, 2026
License:
CC-BY 4.0

Download the latest version of this resource data as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A) or the resource metadata as EML or RTF:

Data as a DwC-A file download 4,139 records in English (285 KB) - Update frequency: as needed
Metadata as an EML file download in English (27 KB)
Metadata as an RTF file download in English (12 KB)

Description

This dataset contains mammal occurrence records (November 2023 - February 2026) from the Western Ghats, collected using a mobile collection application (EpiCollect5). A few reptiles are also added opportunistically. This includes data from three data sources:1. Western Ghats Mammals(https://five.epicollect.net/project/western-ghats-mammals (private project), 12th July 2024 - 28th February 2026, n=4139)2. Gaur Project (https://five.epicollect.net/project/gaur-project (public project), 4th Jan 2024 - 24th Apr 2024, n=88)3. Monika_Gaur_Survey(https://five.epicollect.net/project/monika-gaur-survey (public project), 28th Nov 2023 - 2nd Dec 2023, n=32)47 taxa are recorded in this dataset.

Data Records

The data in this occurrence resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 4,139 records.

This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.

Versions

The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.

How to cite

Researchers should cite this work as follows:

Nature Conservation Foundation (2026). Occurrence records of mammals from the Western Ghats (primarily Sakleshpur, Anamalais and Nilgiris, India) between November 2023 and February 2026. Version 1.0. Occurrence dataset. https://cloud.gbif.org/asia/resource?r=anam-mammals-2023-26&v=1.0

Rights

Researchers should respect the following rights statement:

The publisher and rights holder of this work is Nature Conservation Foundation. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License.

GBIF Registration

This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: b219d9b5-ab67-46a2-85b6-278cd7e30f93.  Nature Conservation Foundation publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by Participant Node Managers Committee.

Keywords

Occurrence; Observation; tropical rainforests; plantations; Anamalai Hills; Western Ghats; animal distribution; mammals

External data

The resource data is also available in other formats

Mammal occurrence records (2023-25) in central and southern Western Ghats, India [Data set]. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18910401 UTF-8 CSV
Mammal occurrence records (2025-26) in central and southern Western Ghats, India [Data set]. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18923778 UTF-8 CSV

Contacts

T. R. Shankar Raman
  • Originator ●
  • Point Of Contact
  • Senior Scientist
Nature Conservation Foundation
  • 1311, 12th A Main,Vijayanagar 1st Stage
570017 Mysuru
Karnataka
IN
Divya Mudappa
  • Originator ●
  • Point Of Contact
  • Senior Scientist
Nature Conservation Foundation
  • 1311, 12th A Main,Vijayanagar 1st Stage
570017 Mysuru
Karnataka
IN

Geographic Coverage

Multiple locations along the Western Ghats, India; Main locations: Sakleshpur region, Karnataka; Nilgiris, Valparai Plateau and Anamalai Tiger Reserve, Tamil Nadu

Bounding Coordinates South West [10.252, 73.802], North East [17.933, 77.59]

Taxonomic Coverage

Occurrence records of mammals (Class: Mammalia) and a few reptiles found in the Western Ghats and belonging to 47 different taxa

Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Chordata
Class Mammalia, Squamata
Order Carnivora, Artiodactyla, Proboscidea, Soricomorpha, Rodentia, Chiroptera, Lagomorpha, Primates
Family Varanidae, Pteropodidae, Platacanthomyidae, Viverridae, Sciuridae, Tragulidae, Leporidae, Bovidae, Felidae, Canidae, Soricidae, Ursidae, Cervidae, Colubridae, Muridae, Mustelidae, Elephantidae, Cercopithecidae, Hystricidae, Suidae, Herpestidae

Temporal Coverage

Start Date / End Date 2023-11-28 / 2026-02-28

Project Data

Mammal occurrence records 2023-26

Title Tropical Rainforest Research and Ecological Restoration in the Anamalai Hills, Western Ghats, India
Identifier ncf-arrp
Funding Various
Study Area Description Western Ghats locations
Design Description Opportunistic observations

The personnel involved in the project:

Aashra Iype
  • User
Abhirami C.
  • User
Ahirbudhnyan M.
  • User
M. Ananda Kumar
  • User
Anand M. Osuri
  • User
Arunachala Skaria Gamuz
  • User
Divya Mudappa
  • User
Ganesh Raghunathan
  • User
P. Jeganathan
  • User
K. Kannan
  • User
Khushi Mohan
  • User
Manu Nair
  • User
Monika C.
  • User
Gopana Nanda Kumar
  • User
A. Sathish Kumar
  • User
Sneha Sakthivel
  • User
K. B. Sonia
  • User
Srinivasan Kasinathan
  • User
Sujay G.
  • User
T. R. Shankar Raman
  • User
S. Vijay Kumar
  • User
Vijay Karthick
  • User

Sampling Methods

Opportunistic observations of signs or sightings of mammals were recorded on the mobile application in an ad hoc manner. The sightings were often (but not always) along roads traversed by researchers for other activities. All records were recorded on a mobile application (EpiCollect5).

Study Extent Mammals were recorded across the Western Ghats but primarily within three clusters: (1) Anamalai Tiger Reserve and the adjoining Valparai Plateau in the Anamalai Hills, Tamil Nadu (2) Forests and plantations of Nilgiris Hills and adjoining forests in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka (3) Forests in and around Sakleshpur district centred in the Kadamane Estate of Karnataka
Quality Control Data were checked for erroneous records, missing information, and location outliers.

Method step description:

  1. Common names of species were matched to scientific names on GBIF backbone.

Additional Metadata

Acknowledgements
Purpose
Maintenance Description This is an ongoing effort and future uploads will be made as separate datasets. Updates to this will be only in the nature of corrections if required.
Alternative Identifiers https://cloud.gbif.org/asia/resource?r=anam-mammals-2023-26