Population monitoring & annual census
Regular monitoring and an annual census through pre-monsoon surveys, roosting-site checks and trained volunteer teams.
Flagship programme since 2004-05
Sarus Crane conservation in the Gondia landscape
Gondia supports the southernmost breeding population of the Sarus Crane in India. SEWA has monitored it since 2004-05.
Twenty years of counting
- 2004-05 6 counting begins
- 2011-12 52 peak
- 2019-20 45 held
- 2026 32 latest count
Six birds to fifty-two — 9× in seven years
When SEWA started counting in 2004-05 there were six Sarus Cranes left in Gondia district. Seven years later there were fifty-two. That rise was not luck: it came from an annual census that never missed a year, farmers who agreed to leave a nest standing in a working field, and a district that learned to recognise the bird in its own paddy. The population then held in the high thirties and forties for a decade, reaching forty-five again in 2019-20.
And now down 13 birds — 29% — since 2020
The 2026 census recorded thirty-two birds in Gondia — the lowest count in twenty years of monitoring, and thirteen fewer than in 2019-20. In a population this small that is not statistical noise; it is roughly one bird in four. The work that built the recovery still runs, but it is currently being outpaced, and it needs to be bigger than it is.
Across the whole landscape the 2026 census recorded 82 birds — 32 in Gondia and 50 across the state line in Balaghat, Madhya Pradesh. It is one population in two states, which is why the work runs in both. Landscape Partnership Initiative final report, 21 March 2026.
Why Gondia
The southernmost breeding population in India
The Sarus Crane is the world's tallest flying bird, and it nests in working paddy fields rather than in protected forest. That single fact shapes the whole programme: the birds survive or fail on private farmland, so conservation here is inseparable from what farmers are able to do.
Because Gondia holds the species' southern limit in India, a loss here is not a local loss. It contracts the range of the species itself.
Monitor
Protect
Engage
Restore
Empower
Sustain
The nine initiatives
What the programme actually consists of, from census work through to the electricity network.
Protecting the southernmost population
Gondia holds the southernmost breeding population of Sarus Crane in India, making this landscape particularly important to the species' long-term survival.
Nest & breeding-site protection
Surveillance of breeding areas, protection of nests and chicks, and engagement of local communities to reduce disturbance and improve breeding success.
Sarus-friendly & sustainable farming
Reduced-chemical and sustainable practices in Sarus habitats, farmer awareness of harmful agrochemicals, and work with the Agriculture Department on safer methods.
Power-line & electrocution mitigation
Mapping power lines across Sarus presence and movement areas, identifying high-risk locations, and proposing coordinated mapping with MSEDCL so future connections in sensitive areas follow Sarus-friendly safety measures.
Community & school awareness
Programmes in villages and schools on Sarus conservation, wetland protection, nest safety and major threats, encouraging students to become conservation ambassadors.
The Sarus Mitra network
Identifying farmers and community members who voluntarily protect Sarus nests, supporting them as Sarus Mitras — Friends of the Sarus — and recognising their work.
Wetland & fisher community engagement
Fishing communities engaged as wetland stewards and frontline informants for sightings, roost monitoring and reporting of distressed birds.
Biodiversity Management Committees
Supporting village-level BMCs to become active conservation institutions, involving farmers, fisherfolk, youth, Gram Panchayat representatives and local knowledge holders.
Twenty years of counting
SEWA's own annual census in Gondia district. The population climbed from six birds to a peak of fifty-two, then settled into the high thirties — and the most recent count is the lowest since 2006-07.
Counts are recorded as approximate in SEWA's own reports and are reproduced as given. The dashed segment spans years for which we hold no published count; it is not an estimate of what happened in between.
How the count is made
A number is only as good as its method
- Conducted every year since 2004-05, over two days — one for Gondia, one for Balaghat.
- Timed for the second week of June, just before the monsoon and the breeding season.
- Counted at pre-identified roosting sites rather than by random sampling, because the birds forage over a wide area by day.
- Two trained volunteers per site, in position before sunrise at 5am, for three to four hours.
- Every team carries the others' numbers, so a bird seen moving between sites is not counted twice.
- Each site returns a structured form: count, time of sighting, GPS coordinates.
What the losses look like
Recorded, not estimated
Every one of these is a bird SEWA's team found, dated and reported. In a population this small each line is roughly one per cent of it.
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Poisoning 17 December 2010
Panjhara lake, Gondia · A pair found dead
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Bait poisoning 31 January 2011
Jhilmili lake, Gondia · Found critical, died during treatment
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Power line 21 December 2017
Lohara lake · Referred to the Transit Treatment Centre, Nagpur; died
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Poisoning 2018
Dangorli village, Gondia · Carried to Gondia Range office by SEWA, referred to Nagpur; died
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Electrocution 5 October 2019
Malutola, Dasgaon · Sub-adult
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Electrocution 29 June 2020
Dasgaon village · Sub-adult, found under the lines in a paddy field
Sarus Friendly Rice
Making a nest worth something to the farmer whose field holds it
Sarus Friendly Rice promotes reduced chemical dependence and wildlife-friendly practice in breeding landscapes. Farmers move from being beneficiaries of a conservation programme to being the people running it — and the agronomy improves alongside the habitat rather than at its expense.
SEWA works with the Agriculture Department and ATMA on safer agricultural practice, and with MSEDCL on mapping power lines so that future connections through Sarus movement areas carry safety measures from the start.
What the decline is telling us
Five pressures, and none of them are a mystery
A fall from 45 birds to 32 in a population this small is not a rounding error. Every one of the causes below is either an incident SEWA recorded in the field or a pressure named in its own conservation brief — which also means every one of them has something that can be done about it.
Electrocution on power lines
Three of the six deaths SEWA documented between 2010 and 2020 were birds killed on distribution lines — at Lohara lake, Malutola and Dasgaon. New connections keep being run through fields the cranes feed and roost in.
Poisoning and agrochemicals
The other three were poisonings, including deliberate bait at Jhilmili lake. Pesticide use in the paddy the birds feed in is the same pressure in slower form.
Wetland loss and disturbance
Sarus need shallow, undisturbed water to nest and roost. The Malguzari tanks silt up, get encroached or get drawn down at the wrong time of year, and each one lost removes a breeding option.
Nests inside a working crop
A nest sits in someone's field during the season that field has to be worked. Changes in sowing dates, mechanised harvesting and simple disturbance decide whether eggs reach hatching.
Five years without a published count
The record runs 2004-05 to 2020-21 and then resumes in 2026. Nobody can yet say which of those years the loss happened in — which is itself an argument for keeping the census funded and annual.
This is where you come in
A Sarus nest in your field is protected, and the household protecting it is recognised as a Sarus Mitra. If you have seen a nest, or a bird in difficulty, the field team wants to hear from you today — not next season.
Call +91 9420515041 Join the Sarus Mitra networkSupported & recognised by
- IUCN
- WWF-India
- KfW Development Bank
- German Cooperation (GIZ)
- Maharashtra Forest Dept
- Satpuda Foundation
- VNCS