Elephant conservation news 24 July - 31 JulyNepalese officials have been sent to an area in the east of the country after months of clashes between elephants and villagers, BBC News has reported.
More than 200 elephants have left a trail of destruction through villages and paddy fields while migrating from India to Nepal over the past two months. The elephants are said to have destroyed crops and injured and even killed locals, prompting villagers to shoot at the animals.
On 17 July, several conservation groups from Nepal and India held crisis talks about the conflict, after Indian wildlife officials said that the Forest Department was not taking the shootings seriously.
Following the shooting of a herd of elephants near the border at the beginning of July, Animesh Basu of the Himalayan Nature and Adventure Foundation said: "This is the second such incident in a month which is alarming."Several elephants were shot at the same spot two years ago. Despite repeated requests, the forest department has not taken up the matter."
The Nepalese Government has said that that it will compensate villagers who have lost family members or been injured by elephants in the area.
Crippled elephant given false foot
An elephant who was crippled after its foot was caught in a trap is walking again thanks to a prosthetic aide, according to The Telegraph.
It was feared that the three-year-old elephant, named Chhouk by his rescuers, would not survive after he was found in the Pprepol Wilderness in Cambodia with a severely infected foot.
However, after having saved the elephant by removing 12 cm of infected tissue and cleaning his wounds, the rescue team commissioned the Cambodian School of Prosthetics and Orthotics to make Chhouk a new foot.
Chhouk now spends his time with a ten-year-old female elephant in their enclosure at Phron Tamae Zoo.
Nick Marx, director of the Wildlife Alliance's Cambodian rescue centre, said: "Our keepers and vets have done a fantastic job; he is now healthy and happy.
"Fortunately Chhouk is also blessed with a fighting spirit himself and without this he may well not have made it.
