Copters herd 24 jumbos home
2006-07-18 19:46
Giyani - Only two of 26 elephants that escaped from the Kruger National Park last week had to be shot and killed.
The rest were chased back into the reserve with helicopters on Monday afternoon, said Moses Tseli of Limpopo's department of economic development, environment and tourism on Tuesday.
The jumbos escaped from the northern part of the park last week. Two were put down on Monday afternoon in Nsavulani village east of Giyani.
Tseli said: "We put down two of the elephants because they were aggressive.
The meat was handed out to residents of Nsavulani and Phalbopeni villages.
Tseli said the fence that the elephants broke in their escape was being repaired.
Huge cull proposed
In September last year, six escaped elephants were killed and fed to residents of Cunningmore B village near Bushbuckridge.
The jumbos had strayed 30km from the park, through the densely populated Mkhuhlu area, to the village.
At the time, the department considered it too dangerous to chase them back over such a long distance.
The Kruger is estimated to have a population of 12 467 elephants.
SANParks has proposed culling between 5 000 and 7 000 elephants to reduce their impact on the veld and preserve the biodiversity of the park.