Forest officials deploy drones, traps as tiger kills fourth cattle in Turkapally
A tiger roaming in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district attacked a calf at Gandamalla village, marking the fourth such incident since January 17. Villagers discovered pugmarks and reported the attack to forest officials, who installed camera traps and deployed drones to monitor the predator.
Hyderabad: After a gap of nearly a week, the tiger moving around Turkapally mandal in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri mandal attacked a calf at Gandamalla village on Sunday morning.
According to local villagers, the tiger attacked a calf at the cattle shed of C Narasimhulu and then dragged it for around a kilometre into the forest area. The visit of the tiger to the village outskirts came to light when around 6.30 am, Narsimhulu had gone to the cattle shed to milk the cows and found a calf missing.
While searching the surroundings, Narsimhulu noticed pugmarks of a tiger and alerted villagers. “I followed the pugmarks and went towards the forest for about a kilometre. I saw a big tiger preying on the calf on the rocks,” Narsimhulu told Telangana Today.
The man then returned to the village and informed the village sarpanch B Ramulu, who later informed the forest officials. A team of forest officials rushed to the spot and recorded the pugmarks. Camera traps have been installed and a cage placed around the spot where the tiger had attacked and preyed upon the calf.
B Ramulu said forest department officials have alerted them against moving alone into the field and to return home before dusk. The shepherds were asked not to venture into the forest. “Fear has gripped the village after the incident. It is for the first time in the past several decades that the tiger movement has been noticed here,” he said.
The forest department has formed several teams to monitor the tiger movement and a five-member team of animal trackers joined the efforts to prevent any tiger–human conflict. Thermal camera drones were also used to track the movement of the tiger in the forest patches.
It is the fourth instance of the tiger attacking cattle in Yadadri Bhuvanagiri since its entry into the district on January 17. It had attacked two calves at Ibrahimpura on the night of January 17, moved to Ralla Jangaon roughly 12 km from Ibrahimpur and attacked a calf on January 24, then moved to Dattaipally near Ibrahimpur village and attacked two cows and a calf on January 26. After a gap of five days, it attacked a calf at Gandamalla village on Sunday.
