Man-animal conflict, accident kills two elephants in Tamil Nadu’s Coimbatore

Chennai: In two tragic incidents that occurred in different parts of Coimbatore district of Tamil Nadu, a middle-aged female elephant and a young male elephant were killed. The first was a case of man-animal conflict that occurred near Mettuplayalam, the foothills of the famed Ooty hill station. The second incident occurred in the Mudumalai tiger reserve, where an elephant died of electrocution in an accident. 

In the first incident, a heard of elephants were said to be raiding crops in a farm. Later at night, when the owners of the farm had stepped out to chase the elephants away, a female elephant fro the herd charged at the men. It is said that one of them fired their illegally-possessed, country-made rifle, which ended up wounding and later killing the elephant. 

Forest officials denied that this was an attempt at poaching or other wildlife-trade related crimes. “We have arrested two brothers Ramasamy and Krishnawamy, who own the farm and they also confessed to the crime. We have arrested and remanded the duo. We have seized their country-made gun and ammunition as well. This is not a case of poaching, because it is the male elephants that are usually targeted for their tusks," said D Venkatesh, Divisional Forest Officer, Coimbatore. 

This case had come to the notice of the forest department after locals found the carcass with a wound near the ears. Later, during the post-mortem, it was established that the bullet had ended up in the pachyderm’s brain. This was a mother elephant that was around 40 years of age.

In the buffer area of the Mudumalai Tiger reserve, a male elephant, barely 18 years of age had ventured into a private resort to feast on bamboo. It is said that elephants regularly enter private resorts as they are not fenced. While pulling the bamboo, a three-phase low tension electricity line that was passing above the bamboo had also unfortunately fallen on the elephant’s tusk and ended up electrocuting it to death. 

“When the bamboo was pulled, the power line also snapped and fell. Usually, whenever there are power lines passing closer to the ground, we work with the electricity board and ensure that they increase its height. Here, despite the wire passing quite high above the ground, it snapped as the bamboo was being pulled and fell on the elephant,” said LCS Srikanth, Deputy Director of Mudumalai Tiger Reserve. 

These two deaths have taken the total number of elephant deaths this year in the Coimbatore region to 14. Forest officials say that while a few are accidents and such man-animal conflict cases, many deaths (according to post-mortem reports) have occurred due to in-fighting between elephants, infections, lesions in the liver, gastrointestinal problems, accidental falls into pits etc. 

Officials add that a wider study which covers the landscape of the Coimbatore and nearby forest region would be required to better understand the causes of deaths. They say that studies must cover the kind of foliage available across the habitat and the invasion of alien plant species etc.