The Phibsoo Wildlife Sanctuary is the second-smallest

national park A national park is a nature park, natural park in use for conservation (ethic), conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state dec ...

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountainous ...

, covering in western

Sarpang District Sarpang District (Dzongkha: གསར་སྤང་རྫོང་ཁག་; Wylie: ''Gsar-spang rdzong-khag''; also known as "Geylegphug") is one of the 20 dzongkhags (districts) comprising Bhutan. Sarpang covers a total area of 1,946 sq km and ...

and southeastern

Dagana District Dagana District is a district located in Bhutan. Most of the district is populated by Dzongkha speakers. However, in the southwest part near the Sarpang District, Nepali language, Nepali is also spoken as a native language. Administrative division ...

along the border with

West Bengal West Bengal (, Bengali: ''Poshchim Bongo'', , abbr. WB) is a state in the eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabitants within an area of . West Bengal is the fourt ...

. It is connected to

Jigme Singye Wangchuck National Park Jigme Singye Wangchuck National Park (formerly Black Mountains National Park) covers an area of in central Bhutan. It protects a large area of the Black Mountains, a sub−range of the Himalayan Range System. The park occupies most of the Tro ...

and

Royal Manas National Park Royal Manas National Park is Bhutan's oldest national park, and the Royal government considers it the "conservation showpiece of the Kingdom" and a "genetic depository" for valuable plants. It has an area of and covers eastern Sarpang District ...

via a "biological corridor" that crosses a national highway. Its elevations range from to . It is separated from the border with India by two rivers, the Sunkosh River to the west and the Sanathang River to the east. The park is recovering from the scars of the ’90s. In those years, when the country had internal problems with the militia, that is why the park only came to life in 2009. The altitude of the terrain is from 200 to 1600 meters.

Flora and fauna

Phibsoo is unique in Bhutan for its

chital The chital or cheetal (''Axis axis''; ), also known as the spotted deer, chital deer, and axis deer, is a deer species native to the Indian subcontinent. It was first described and given a binomial name by German naturalist Johann Christian Po ...

(''Axis axis'', "spotted deer") and natural sal (''Shorea robusta'') forests. Like Royal

Manas National Park Manas may refer to: Philosophy and mythology *Manas, the Pali and Sanskrit term for "mind"; see **Manas (early Buddhism) **Manas-vijnana, one of the eight consciousnesses taught in Yogacara Buddhism *''Ramcharitmanas'', a retelling of the Ramayan ...

, Phibsoo is inhabited by

elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae an ...

bengal tiger The Bengal tiger is a population of the ''Panthera tigris tigris'' subspecies. It ranks among the biggest wild cats alive today. It is considered to belong to the world's charismatic megafauna. The tiger is estimated to have been present in ...

gaur The gaur (''Bos gaurus''; ), also known as the Indian bison, is a bovine native to South Asia and Southeast Asia, and has been listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List since 1986. The global population was estimated at a maximum of 21,000 m ...

, three species of

mahseer Mahseer is the common name used for the genera ''Tor'', ''Neolissochilus'', '' Naziritor'' and '' Parator'' in the family Cyprinidae (carps). The name is, however, more often restricted to members of the genus ''Tor''.Sen TK, Jayaram KC, 1982. Th ...

, and possibly the rare

Ganges river dolphin The Ganges river dolphin (''Platanista gangetica'') is a species of toothed whale classified in the family Platanistidae. It lives in the Ganges and related rivers of South Asia, namely in the countries of India, Nepal, and Bangladesh. It is rel ...

. Phibsoo, however, has no human residents.

References

Wildlife sanctuaries of Bhutan Protected areas of Bhutan Dagana District Sarpang District {{Bhutan-geo-stub

Flora and fauna

See also

References