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Sinharaja jumbo emerges; wildlife officers manage to avert incidents with villagers
Panu kota seen at the border of a tea estate and below, descending a tea estate in the heavy rain. Pix by Nisal Pubudu
‘Panu kota’, an elephant in Sinharaja forest made an appearance last week close to villages in Neluwa. The elephant was first spotted on March 13 in Kosmulla before it started making its way through the villages in an attempt to make an annual migratory route.
The appearance of the elephant saw wildlife officers of the Sinharaja range scrambling to avert in confrontation with villagers.
Udawalawe range officers too supported the difficult mission, following the elephant day and night amidst heavy rains in leech-infested territories. After an operation that lasted five days wildlife officers succeeded in chasing the elephant back to the wilds, Pubudu Prasanna attached to the Sinharaja wildlife office said.
Sinharaja is reportedly home to two male elephants who make a round trip of the range through villages annually, from March to August, sometimes resulting in conflicts with villagers They usually head towards Morningside of Sinharaja and spend the remaining time of the year roaming inside the forest habitat.
These two elephants, believed to be siblings are in their fifties, say villages who remember them as calves along with their mother. The female elephant has not been spotted since the 90s, but these two elephants make an appearance from time to time.
Several attempts to translocate them did not materialise due to concerns raised by environmentalists who pointed out that the only two elephants in the reserve are important representations of the biodiversity that Sinharaja is renowned for,
In the past Sri Lanka’s wet zone had a healthy population of elephants but many were either hunted down by the British in colonial times or caught using kraals to be tamed and used for hard labour.
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