COIMBATORE: A 17-year-old wild elephant died without responding to the treatment at the Koothamandi Reserve Forest near Sirumugai in the district on Tuesday morning. The forest veterinarian who examined the animal’s carcass refuted the claims that the animal was bleeding.
Based on Coimbatore forest veterinarian A Sukumar’s recommendation, the forest department staff provided medicines laced with fruits in the last one week as the animal was weak and continued to stand in a particular place in the reserve forest.
While it was monitored during the day, the jumbo joined its herd at night and roamed the reserve forest before separating in the morning. The Sirumugai forest range staff provided medicines and water, which it also consumed regularly. However, its health did not improve and the elephant was found dead at 6.22 am on Tuesday.
Sukumar, along with Vet Assistant Surgeon K Vijayaragavan of Anamalai Tiger Reserve (ATR) and Sasi Gurunathan of Therampalayam Animal Husbandry Department carried out the postmortem in the presence of forest department officials and members of an NGO.
“There were no external injuries. It may have died due to multiple organ failure induced by infection from consuming fodder or water. We will know how the animal was infected only after testing the samples of the organs at the Advanced Institute for Wildlife Conservation (AIWC) in Chennai this weeks,” said an official.