Tuskers constitute the majority of elephant deaths in the State. Elephant experts blame the tuskers vulnerability on their tendency to stray out of the herd.
As a senior scientist from the Asian Elephant Research and Conservation Centre (AERCC) explained, elephants being social animals, the mother or grandmother in the herd protect the young ones disciplining them to live in the group. But after a certain age, the tuskers tend to break out from the herd for several reasons.
“Most of these males are either driven out of the herd or come out on their own at the age of 12. Being nomadic in nature, they are more at risk due to the rapid loss of their habitat. Such adolescent animals try to explore the places, they tend to visit all the places they have experienced in the past and will become easy prey to the poachers or electrocution when on crop raid," he explained.
Even the male’s effort to stay healthy and strong and dominate the herd makes it stray out of the forest to places where food is easily available.
Other problems include forest department's apathy towards their own staff, the forest watchers. The watchers, being the local tribals, often play a key role in protecting the forest by checking poaching and electrocution, chasing back the animal which stray out.
The staff in Bandipur have not been paid since past five months, while it is even worse in Nagarhole, sources said.
