Cape Town - There is an elephant living in the Knysna forest that appears to dislike forestry vehicles.
On Monday, staff working in the pine plantations adjacent to the indigenous forest came to work to find the elephant had punctured one of the tyres on a the vehicles – again.
Riaan Stander, who works in his father’s forestry company, ZD Stander, said the elephant had been “rather active” in the last few weeks.
They call him “Oupoot”, or Old Foot.
“There was the tyre on Monday morning, and on Wednesday last week it pushed a vehicle over, and on Tuesday it punctured one tyre. Then the week before, it threw one of the vehicles over,” Stander said.
The company is felling the pines in the commercial plantation, adjacent to the Goudveld region of the indigenous Knysna forest, managed by SANParks. The two company vehicles working there are left at the plantation overnight.
“The elephant lives in the forest, not in the pines, but it walks through the pines to get from one part of the forest to the other. There are only two vehicles there, and I don’t know if he does that because they are in his path, or if he doesn’t like the smell of diesel, or what,” Stander said.
Stander, who is descended from the old Knysna forest cutters, said he had joked with the company foreman after the second of the elephant vehicle “attacks”, and said his father had always told them he had slept in the trees for safety. He suggested they hide the vehicle, a Bell logger, in the forest overnight for safety against another elephant attack.
“But the elephant found it. They had put it in quite thick forest, but he got it and pushed it over and punctured the tyres. There was elephant dung all around. I told the guys there was so much dung around, it looked as if he had worked really hard to push the Bell over.”
Stander said the two punctured tyres cost R48 000. They had never tried to claim from their insurance company, but yesterday they decided the elephant was costing them too much and they filed a claim.
“I don’t know if they will pay, but we have to try.”
Stander said he had seen the elephant only once, a few years ago. He was in a truck and said he had seen the trees moving, but it was only when he was about 15m from the elephant that he saw it. He was so close he could hear its stomach growling.
“I couldn’t see if it was a bull or a cow, but my father believes it is a bull because of how it behaves with the vehicles.”
Nandi Mgwadlamba, spokeswoman for SANParks Garden Route National Park, said their scientists were doing research on all the animals in the Knysna forest, including the elephants.
They could confirm that there was at least one elephant, but said that did not rule out that they may be as many as five.
Cape Times