Tiger Reserves

MYSURU: An eight-year-old tiger was found dead and its nails and teeth were missing in the Bandipur reserve forest area in a suspected case of poisoning.
During a patrol, forest staff came across the tigers carcass at Gundre range in Gundlupet taluks Hediyala division on Monday. A postmortem revealed the tigers nails and upper and lower canine teeth were missing, indicating foul play. Its pelt was intact.
The carcass of a calf -the prey of the tiger -was found six metres from the tigers body. Forest officials could not get the samples of the dead calf. A basic test on the tigers viscera sample suggested the big cat may have been killed by poisoning. We ve sent the sample for a forensic examination, a senior forest officer said. It is possible the miscreants may have poi soned the calf after it was killed by the tiger. Such instances have been reported from Bandipur forest in the past, and the modus operandi in the present case looks similar.
Principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife) BJ Hosmath and Bandipur Tiger Reserve director T Heeralal visited the site. An FIR was registered against unidentified persons. The case may be transferred to the CID, the states top probe agency.
Some months ago, a black panther and two leopards were found dead in Bandipur reserve, and a probe concluded all the animals were fed toxic food which led to their death. A forest officer recalled that a tiger was similarly poisoned deep inside the forest and its parts were stolen about three years ago. Around the same time, at least two tigers were poisoned to death in Nagarahole reserve.