As population of spotted deer is growing at a fast pace in Van Vihar National Park, more than 300 herbivores have been shifted to other forest areas of the State. The park has planned to shift around 200 more spotted deer to various tiger reserves. On experiment basis, the park also shifted a female black buck to Kheoni Wildlife Sanctuary. Earlier, during year 2010-11, black buck was shifted to other reserve but he died of myopia.

After this incident, Forest Department could not plan project of black buck shifting.

Deputy Director of Van Vihar A K Jain said that the park has capacity of 200 cheetals. At present, there are more than 500 cheetals in the park due to which they are being shifted to other reserves.

In the first phase, spotted deer were sent to Gandhi Sagar Sanctuary, Ratapani Sanctuary and Ralamandal Sanctuary. In the second phase, cheetals are being shifted to Kheoni Sanctuary and nearby forest areas of Dewas. Last month, a group of 16 spotted deer were shifted from Van Vihar National Park to Kheoni Wildlife Sanctuary in Dewas. After witnessing rise in population of Cheetal (spotted deer) at Van Vihar National Park, Forest Department gave its consent to translocate them in other forest areas. There is also proposal to release some cheetal in Gandhi Sagar Wildlife Sanctuary near Mandsaur.

Population of cheetals has increased at Van Vihar, while on the other side habitat of Van Vihar remains unsuitable for rare Hard Ground Barasingha species. The park has received 7 Barasingha during year 2015 from Kanha Tiger Reserve.

During year 2019 there population was increased to 14. Now, the park is left with only 10 deer as four have died. Earlier, they were kept in an enclosure but after keeping view the health status, they were left in open. The open area of Van Vihar could not