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Poachers kill one of the world's largest elephants in Kenya
[Telegraph] One of Africa's last 'great tuskers', elephants with ivory weighing over 100lbs, has been poisoned to death by poachers in Kenya after years of adapting his behaviour to hide himself from humans.The bull, named Satao and likely born in the late 1960s, succumbed to wounds from poison darts in a remote corner of Tsavo National Park where he had migrated to find fresh water after recent storms. His carcass yesterday lay with its face and great tusks hacked off, four legs splayed where he fell with his last breath, left only for the vultures and the scavengers. Conservationists told how he moved from bush to bush always keeping his ivory hidden amongst the foliage. "I'm convinced he did that to hide his tusks from humans, he had an awareness that they were a danger to him," said Mark Deeble, a British documentary filmmaker who has spent long periods of time filming Satao. A soaring demand for ivory in a number of Asian nations has seen poaching reach levels that were last seen in the 1980s before the ivory trade was banned. Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 2014-06-16 |
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