NINETY elephant carcasses have been discovered in Botswana with their tusks hacked off, a charity said yesterday, in what is believed to be one of Africa’s worst mass poaching sprees.

Most of the animals killed were large bulls carrying heavy tusks, Elephants Without Borders said.

The grim discovery was made over several weeks during an aerial survey by the group and Botswana’s Department of Wildlife and National Parks.

“We started flying the survey on July 10, and we have counted 90 elephant carcasses since the survey commenced,” said Mike Chase, the charity director. “Each day we are counting dead elephants.”

The animals were shot with heavy-caliber rifles at watering spots near a popular wildlife sanctuary in the Okavango Delta.

“The scale of elephant poaching is by far the largest I have seen or read about in Africa to date,” Chase said.

The poaching coincided with the disarming earlier this year of Botswana’s rangers, according to Chase.

The country has the largest elephant population in Africa at over 135,000.  (SD-Agencies)