Scientists puzzled as elephant seen ‘smoking’ in forest

A video from the forests India has surfaced on the social media showing an elephant smoking in the woods, leaving scientists baffled.

The astonishing 49-second clip posted by the Wildlife Conservation Society-India captures an elephant leaving wisps of smoke in the air which makes it look like it was smoking.

Scientists have theorised it may have been trying to eat the wood for medicinal reasons.

“I believe the elephant may have been trying to ingest wood charcoal,” said Dr Varun Goswami, WCS India scientist and elephant biologist.

“She appeared to be picking up pieces from the forest floor, blowing away the ash that came along with it, and consuming the rest.”

However, only when the camera zooms in, what was really going on in the deep forest of the Nagarhole National Park can be inferred.

According to reports, the elephant was trying to ingest wood charcoal. So, he picked up something burnt from the forest floor, and started blowing away the ash that came along with it and consumed the rest.

“This unusual behaviour of an elephant was captured on video from Nagarahole National Park and has us perplexed. Our colleague, Mr Vinay Kumar, was travelling with our field staff in a partially burnt patch of the moist deciduous forests when this elephant appeared in their view. The video he captured has had experts trying todecipher the unique behaviour. The elephant would draw up a trunk full of ash close to her mouth and blow it out in a puff of smoke!” the viral video was captioned.

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