Madikeri: An elephant calf, which escaped from a coffee plantation after its mother’s death, was found wandering in about a 10 km radius of the site even as foresters are trying to rescue and rehabilitate it. On Saturday, a female elephant was found dead due to internal injuries in a coffee plantation in Anandpur Puliyeri village near Ammathi.Its one-year-old female calf was mourning its mother’s death and briefly obstructed the postmortem examination of the dead mother elephant. The forest department rescued the calf and tied it with a rope, but the calf escaped from the spot.The foresters launched an operation to locate it, but despite searching till Sunday night, the calf was not found. On Monday, about 40 personnel, led by Virajpet range forest officer Shivaram, located the calf in Chennayyanna Kote village of Thithimathi range forest. But it escaped from there as well. Now the forest department has launched an operation to rescue the calf at night.
