Police in Zimbabwe arrested six black men accused of using cyanide to poison elephants on Friday, according to local media reports.
Authorities recovered about $120,000 worth of ivory from 17 tusks, the Zimbabwe Chronicle reported. The police fingered Farai Chitsa (34) as the suspected mastermind.
The suspects laced salt licks at watering holes frequented by the elephants with cyanide.Chitsa supplied the poison.
“What they were doing is very cruel because it does not end with the death of the elephants,” Chief Inspector Muyambirwa Muzzah told the Chronicle.
“We have what we call the fourth generation effect due to the potency of cyanide as a poison. Animals that feed on the dead elephants will die, and those that feed on the dead animals will also die.”
The elephants were found in the Hwange National Park after a ranger heard gunshots.
The park’s spokeswoman Caroline Washaya Moyo told BBC News that tests would confirm cyanide was in fact used to kill the animals.
That 41 elephants have died makes it Zimbabwe’s worst case of poaching, Moyo said. Elephant poaching in Africa is on the rise and ivory trade has doubled since 2007.
Poachers kill 30 elephants in Tanzania every day.
A report from CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) said poachers killed 25,000 African elephants last year.