Anthropogenic driven range expansion of Asian elephant Elephas maximus in an agricultural landscape and its consequences in South West Bengal, India

Abstract

Alterations of the geographical ranges of animals have become a reason for interactions with humans, leading to various consequences. We describe the pattern of range expansion of Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) and implications for human-elephant interactions in the agricultural landscape of South West Bengal, India. We enquired about past and current sightings of Asian elephants from local people to gather information on range expansion from the 1950 s to 2018. We also collected the records of human deaths and injuries by elephants from 2010 to 2018 from the records of the Forest Department. We employed an occupancy framework to understand the probability of the occurrence of elephants in the landscape from 2010 to 2018. The range of elephants in the landscape increased from ∼ 1200 km2 in the 1950–60 s to ∼ 13200 km2 by 2010–18. The calculated probability of use of grid cells was 36 % and the forest edge had a high influence on the space usage by the elephants. Elephants occurred in an average of 26 grid cells per month, and the number of grid cells with elephants did not differ between the months. A total of 640 attacks on humans occurred, which significantly varied between the years. The probability of elephant occurrence in a grid cell was the major determinant factor for the elephant attacks on humans. Although people respect elephants, there is a sense of intolerance towards them if they enter the crop fields, owing to the small land holdings and the incapacity to endure the monetary losses of the farmers.