7 Elephants Found Dead Outside Hwange National Park
Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (Zimparks) rangers last week found the decomposing carcasses of seven elephants at the Ngamo Forest on the outskirts of the Hwange National Park.
Zimparks spokesperson, Tinashe Farawo, told VicFallsLive on Thursday that the seven elephants, that included a bull and calves, died two months ago.
Farawo also revealed that tests carried out so far have ruled out cyanide poisoning. Said Farawo:
Our investigations are still ongoing, but the laboratory results ruled out the suspicion of them dying from cyanide poisoning but we are still exploring the possible causes of their deaths.
The seven deceased elephants were a family because there was a bull, substandard ones and calves.
Hyenas and vultures could’ve also immediately died because they fed on the corpses but patrol officers did not come across any that had died, so we suspect that they might have died from an infection that is still under investigation.
Their ivory was also still intact, so the other theory could be that they succumbed to a natural cause because when elephants age, their teeth fall off and at times their trunks could be faulty which affects their breeding patterns causing some problems which eventually leads to death.
