# Ajayan

Injured wild tusker ‘Arikkomban’ was tranqualized twice, the second on Monday, paradoxically on World Environment Day. It is now to be translocated from Kerala’s Periyar Tiger Reserve to a forest range inside Tamil Nadu.

The wound on its trunk is deep and, according to veterinarians, it has to be treated immediately before it is let out into the wild.

The trunk, like the right hand for humans, is vital for elephants, especially for feeding and drinking water. Generally, animals lick or touch their wounds on any other part as a way for healing. But in this wild tusker’s case, the wound is right at the centre of the trunk. If untreated, it can prove disastrous. It appears to be a myiasis wound (maggot-infested).

Veterinarian Shaji Panikkasseri, who has led post mortems of over 20 elephants, told Metro Vaartha, that from the appearance of the wound as seen on TV screen, there is need for immediate treatment. Left untreated, such maggot-infested wounds and filled with larvae can turn really lethal, he warns.

He adds that before the tusker is sent into the wild, the wound will have to be treated. There is no need to keep the elephant captive as there are medicines whose effect stays on for more than three weeks.

The wound, going by the images when the tusker was taken to PTR and now when it was captured in the wee hours of Monday, appears to have grown deeper and wider.

Another expert in the Kerala Veterinary and Animal Science University said that given the condition of the wound, priority was for its treatment. Left in the wild, this tusker which has been translocated twice within a month and struggling to get acclimatized to the environs, would find itself in dire straits because of the wound too.