TN forest officials try to unite calf elephant with herd after mother dies in Thadagam reserve forest
COIMBATORE: Forest department staff and officials are trying to unite a two-month-old calf elephant with a herd after its mother died near the Thadagam reserve forest in Pannimadai on Tuesday morning.
Postmortem examination revealed that the elephant died due to pulmonary cardiac failure in the wee hours on Tuesday.
Forest department officials saw the carcass of the female elephant, which had died in a frog-sitting position at a Pattaland, when they got information about the lone calf and were looking for it.
An officer said, “The animal could be aged 30 years. There were no external injuries. The Heart, lung, and liver were congested. We suspect that the animal fell down due to illness and tried to get up. However, it failed and turned into the frog sitting posture, leading to the prolonged sternal recumbency resulting in pulmonary-cardiac failure. We have taken samples of the internal organs for forensic analysis, microbiological examination, as well as histopathological examination to find out the cause of the illness.”
As rumours spread that the elephant died of gunshot injury, DFO N Jayaraj, in a statement, said masto temporal gland discharge from a lactating female elephant is being falsely spread by some as a gunshot wound.
Meanwhile, a six-month-old cow calf was killed allegedly by a leopard at Thammampathy near Pollachi on Monday. The leopard entered the farm owned by P Maheswari from a forest which is two km away.