A 45-day-old leopard cub got separated from its mother and fell into a farm pond in a mango plantation in Setturu village of Anantapur district on Friday and was rescued by Forest Department Officials. The Kalyandurg, Rayadurg and Uravakonda forest areas (including unreserved revenue forests) is a habitat for close to 40 leopards.
The cub, however, died last night while being shifted to Tirupati Zoo. The cub could not handle the shock of the human interactions and a 7-hour travel to the Tirupati Zoo. The carcass was brought back from Tirupati to Anantapur on Saturday and post-mortem conducted at the Nagara Vanam in Pampanur village. The carcass was consigned to flames in the presence of the DFO and other forest officials, said Rayadurg Forest Range Officer R. Ram Singh.
After the farmer found the cub in the small pond meant for water storage on the farm on Friday, he informed the Forest Department officials, who kept the cub there till evening and sent it in a car to Tirupati Zoo. The veterinary doctor, who conducted the post-mortem said that though it was fed with milk, it underwent shock and could not tolerate it. Leopard cubs survive only on mother’s milk for three months.
Its mother could not be traced by the officials and the forest officials tried to keep it close to the nearby forest so that its mother could return to take her cub, but when it did not return for a long time, the officials sent it to the zoo, but minutes before reaching the destination, the cub died.
