Elephant succumbs to mouth injuries

It is learnt that villagers who were returning home after grazing their goats noticed strong foul smell emanating on the way and found the juvenile jumbo dead. Forest Department personnel said that it could have died about three days ago. While the cause of death could not be ascertained, it is suspected that poor intake of food due to the wounds could have resulted in its death. Forest personnel, who were treating the animal for sores in the mouth, suspected that wounds were the resultant of an infight.

A senior department officer said that the elephant was roaming with another elephant of the same age near Alandurai over the last few months. As the elephant struggled to take medicines mixed with fodder, foresters fed the elephant with medicines in liquid form.  An officer said that the elephant was showing improvement and that they were monitoring it regularly. 

“The cause of death will be known only after post-mortem is conducted in the presence of NGO representatives on Saturday,” a department officer said. Less than two months ago, a four-year-old baby elephant that was badly injured in the mouth after it bit a country-made bomb (used by farmers close to the forest boundary to kill wild boars) died at Thadagam area in Coimbatore.