Rajkot:

A tigress in the RMC run Rajkot Zoological Park (Pradhyumn Park Zoo) has died of snake-bite, Superintendent of the Zoo, Ranchhod Hirpara today said.

He said that the around 12 and a half year old tigress, was among one of the two yellow tigresses of the zoo and was completely healthy despite ripe age.

‘She looked a bit unwell after the closure of the zoo last evening when all the schedule one animals are taken away from display areas and put in cages. Later she fainted and went in to coma and died at around 930 pm despite all out efforts of the zoo vets to save her,’ Hirpara said.

‘Ours is a zoo kept in natural form where the display etc is quite big which makes it possible the entry of snake there. During postmortem of the tigress by a panel of 3 doctors this morning a snake bite mark on her left thigh was found and it was also revealed that she was bitten by a viper snake,’ he added.

‘Our zoo is has 51 species of animals and birds and with 18 Asiatic lions, 7 white tigers and 2 yellow tigress of which one has been lost in snake bite incident,’ the zoo superintendent said.

DeshGujarat