Is this the culprit?

By Srilal Miththapala

Speculation is rife that the young bull elephant with a single tusk, seen recently along the Yala main road, could probably be the elephant that attacked the great tusker Tilak of Yala a few days ago, fatally wounding him. He has been sighted in roughly the same area that the incident happened, by a few visitors. 

From the post mortem carried out, it was concluded that Tilak had sustained deep wounds, leading to the conclusion that it was probably caused by a single tusk during the altercation. Hence the suspicion has fallen on this young bull with a single tusk.

However a few of us are rather sceptical since the bull seems to be relatively young and not in musth.  It is rare for elephants to fight seriously, and on such occasions it is even rarer to have a younger bull attack a much more senior individual. Most often such altercations are between two big adults. 

In addition such fights almost always take place when the bulls are in musth, a periodic physiological phenomena that adult male elephants go through when they become very sexually active. This results in their testosterone levels reaching extremely high levels, and consequently they become quite aggressive. 

Hence one cannot jump to conclusions as yet, until more light is shed on the real incident, which unfortunately does not seem to have been witnessed by anyone (or at least no one has yet come forward saying so).