ANTI-POACHING K9 PROJECT

Rural farmers are resorting to lethal methods such as Jaw Bombs and Trap Guns to kill wild animals including elephants. The Trap Guns are mounted along pathways that elephants enter fields while Jaw Bombs are used to bait pumpkins, watermelons and cucumbers and left in the fields and home gardens. The Trap Gun causes grievous bodily injuries while the Jaw Bombs shatters the jaw, mandible, and palate of any animal that bites on them. The injuries from Jaw Bombs subject elephants to an agonizing and prolonged death from starvation.

​The Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society is planning to establish the first K9 Anti-poaching unit in Wasgamuwa to track and scent Jaw Bombs, Trap Guns and Snares. The K9 unit will work with the police, forest and wildlife rangers in detecting these diabolical devices in the villages, national park and forests reserves in Wasgamuwa. Using trained K9’s is the most safe and effective way to detect these lethal devices, and to apprehend and prosecute the manufacturers of these deadly devices and the villagers who use them.