Monsoon brings cheer for animals, relief to people near forests in Kovai

“Setting in of the monsoon has drastically brought down the number of incidents and the time the animals spend outside the forests. Till a month ago the herds used to stray out of the forest for the whole night and go on a rampage, damaging crops to a great extent. Last week the herds spent less than half an hour to an hour out of the forest,” said Ramasubramaniam. 

The number of lone elephants and herds spotted by the department’s field staff outside the forest has also gone down commendably, he added. Unable to quantify improvement of green cover and availability of water in the forests in Coimbatore, he said that their staffs have seen streams and rivers with clear running water and water getting collected in ponds inside the forest. 

Man-elephant conflicts went up drastically in the last two months of 2017. It worsened month after month and claimed the lives of 10 people and as many elephants in the Coimbatore Forest Division (major part of Coimbatore District, excluding Pollachi) in the first five months of the year. Thanks to recent rains following the monsoon, the catchment areas are filling up fast. 

Last week, a herd of elephants bathed in rainwater collected in a pond near Thadagam not very far from the city – which remained dry for many months. Ramasubramaniam also assured that the quality of water should be good as elephants would not drink contaminated water. 

“On the other hand, around 30 per cent of the elephant population are seen to be migrating to Kerala. Every year this happens during the south west monsoon when rainfall is good in that state. 

They will come back to Coimbatore and go to Bhavani when there is good rains here,” he added. Forest department personnel expressed confidence that incidents of wild elephants entering human habitations would come down further as the monsoon intensified.