Drones, CCTV cameras deployed to trace tiger after cattle kills in Eluru district
Tension mounted in the forests of the Kannapuram range in Jangareddygudem revenue division of Eluru district, Andhra Pradesh after a tiger killed two cows in
Tension mounted in the forests of the Kannapuram range in Jangareddygudem revenue division of Eluru district, Andhra Pradesh after a tiger killed two cows in the early hours of Thursday (July 30, 2026). Forest officials sounded an alert in the Koyyalagudem and Buttaigudem forests and began tracking the animal. âThe tiger killed the two cows in the forests near Mangapathidevipeta village in Koyyalagudem. An alert has been sounded in the range,â said Kannapuram Forest Range Officer (FRO) V. Bhanu Prakash.
âAfter killing the cattle, the tiger reportedly moved into the Muttappagudem forests in Buttaigudem mandal,â said Abbu Bulli Raju, a villager. A team of Forest Department officers, led by Rajamahendravaram Divisional Forest Officer Prabhakar Rao, is trying to tranquillise the animal, said Daveedu Raju, another FRO, who is monitoring the operation. âOfficers conducted tom-tom in Mangapathidevipeta, Koyyalagudem and the neighbouring habitations till Wednesday midnight. But the tiger killed two milch cows in the wee hours,â farmer Chebrolu Nageswara Rao told The Hindu.
âWe arranged CCTVs and using drones to trace the tiger in the Agency area in Buttaigudem and Koyyalagudem forests, Mr. Bhanu Prakash said. Forest officials asked villagers not to leave cattle in the forests. Residents remained indoors after the tigerâs movement was sighted, Mr. Nageswara Rao said. Not the regionâs first Cattle kills by a tiger are not new to these mandals. In January-February this year, a sub-adult male from the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve killed 20 heads of cattle across Eluru and East Godavari districts, 14 of them in Eluru, before moving towards the Papikonda Park.
The panic then had kept agricultural workers away from the tobacco fields of Koyyalagudem and Buttayagudem at the peak of harvest. Forest officials had said at the time that a tiger was sighted in the district every one and a half to two years, and that the nearly 600-km stretch between Tadoba-Andhari and the Papikonda Park had become a functional corridor for dispersing tigers.
The BriefWire