Elephant sighting leaves locals worried

MANGALURU: Villagers from Mandekolu in Sullia taluk of Dakshina Kannada district, about 90 km from here, and surrounding villages are worried after they sighted a herd of elephants, recently. They have raised concerns over crop damage. In the last five years, the sighting of elephants has become common in this area that borders Kerala.
According to the forest department, at least two elephant herds are moving around the region. Speaking to TOI, Sullia Range Forest Officer, Manjunath N, said, “We have sighted two elephant herds—one with three and another with five elephants. Last year, there was only one herd with seven elephants including calves moving around in the area. The group probably split. Their presence in the villages is generally early in the morning between 3am and 4am, when they come near the streams of Aletty and Mandekolu to drink water. After drinking water, they may barge into banana plantations and then return back to the forest. In case of crop loss, farmers are compensated adequately as per the government guidelines,” he said.
Elephants generally do not stay in one place and keep moving, in this case between Kerala and Karnataka. About 75 per cent of this region is forests, and once these elephants get water and food, they tend to get back into the forests.
RFO Manjunath said to mitigate the man-animal conflict near agriculture property, elephant proof trenches (EPT) have been laid. “At a few places, EPT could not be laid as the area leads to houses or agriculture land. Elephants tend to use this route to reach fields or plantations. At rivulets or streams, it is not possible to have EPTs. Since two years, to prevent elephants from getting into agriculture land by crossing streams, concrete pillars have been built near the streams,” he said.
Since most of the area is forest land, the presence of elephants is unavoidable. Forest officials have requested villagers to co-operate and support works including laying of EPT and other measures. Farmers are being encouraged to take up solar fencing of agriculture property, for which the government provides subsidy, an officer said.