Wild female elephant found dead

Coimbatore: A female elephant, aged about 20-23 years, was found dead on a piece of patta land near

Thadagam

north beat of the Coimbatore forest range on Thursday. Frontline forest staff were on a patrol at the foothills of Melmudi on Thursday morning when they found the carcass 250m away from the Thadagam reserve forest.Subsequently, forest range officer

R Arun Kumar

reached the spot and informed senior officials. A Sukumar, forest veterinary officer, Coimbatore forest division, collected blood samples from the carcass. The samples were sent to the animal diseases intelligence unit at

Veterinay Polyclinics

campus in Coimbatore. “We suspected that the elephant died of anthrax as there was bleeding on its trunk. But the test result of samples turned negative for anthrax,” an official said. tnn