A group of seven elephants, including a male calf, broke into a rice mill before being driven back into the forest.
Visakhapatnam: A herd of wild elephants ransacked a rice mill in Pedamerangi village of Jiyyammavalasa mandal in Parvathipuram Manyam district in the early hours of Tuesday.
According to elephant monitoring official Manikhanteswara Rao, a group of seven elephants including a male calf came to the mill and broke the front door. He said not much damage was done to the rice stocks or machinery. A couple of elephant trackers could manage to drive them away into a nearby forest.
Last month, the same group of elephants ransacked a rice mill at Khadgavalasa junction in the same mandal.
He said the elephants were straying into revenue villages since there was no continuous forest cover in the area. A fixed pattern of farming was attracting the elephants into the villages.
In November last year, these elephants destroyed 180 coconut trees in Narasipuram village in the district. They eat the tender parts of the coconut trees.
