During the early days of human civilisations, people used snares to capture wild animals for food. However, as humans became more civilised and farming and agricultural strategies evolved, the brutal nature of snares or traps were understood by people. Furthermore, these uncontrolled hunting of innocent wild animals threatened their survival. Therefore, by the common-law putting snares or traps to hunt wild animals was stated to be illegal.
In today’s wild elephant, the young elephant does not appear to be having any problem at first glance. However, if observed cautiously, you might note the elephant calf is having her mouth loosely hanging as if it is panting. This is because this poor guy had victimised by a local explosive known as “Hakka-patas”. The locals use this explosive to hunt for wild animals such as wild boars. Laden with the food they keep these explosives to be consumed by the animals. When bitten they explode, causing severe effects. For large animals like elephants, the injuries are not fatal. Yet, they cause severe damage to the mouth region, including the elephant’s jaw, tongue, and teeth.
Injuries to these vital body parts required to take-in food, make elephants helpless as feeding becomes an impossible task for them. Being unable to feed and the infections of the wounds lead to a gradual and a painful death with a lot of suffering for these innocent creatures. Therefore, when such incidents happen, they should be treated as early as possible.
The team of wildlife officers and vets is trying their best to calm the little fellow and treat her. She is weak and needs immediate care. To treat, the veterinarian meticulously calculated the sedative dose and loaded into a dart and sedated the calf to treat the wounds and provide fluids and intravenous nutrition aids such as glucose.
From this video, the Wild Elephant team would like to convey that; animals do have feelings; therefore, please be humane and refrain from setting up snares to trap these innocent souls.
