Challenges to the Long-Term Survival of Wild Water Buffalo Bubalus arnee (Kerr, 1792) in Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve, Nepal

The study was conducted with main purpose to find out the existing situation of Wild Water Buffalo in KTWR. The Wild Water Buffalo categorized as endangered on the IUCN Red list. Threats were identified by using primary data and secondary data. Freely available satellite imagery Landsat-5 TM (2011), Landsat-8 OLI-TIRS (2015) and Landsat-8 OLI-TIRS (2021) were used for the detection of changes in land cover during the study period. The threats were like feral and domestic animals were sharing same habitat in KTWR. Invasive plant species were found in their habitat. Land cover change analysis (2011-2021) found that Grassland and Sand were decreased by 5.86% and 3.16% respectively. Water body and forest was to be increased by 2.17% and 6.31% respectively. Wild water buffaloes death was occurred unnaturally in every fiscal year than natural death. Tourists following in KTWR fiscal year (2017-2018) were 21,391 from Nepal, 352 tourists from Foreign and 54 tourists from SAARC respectively.