Chinanews, Beijing, December 13 – According to a report by Beijing Evening News, the wild elephants that used to habit only the Shangyong Nature Reserve have started to roam the rural areas of Mengla County, where they are reported to have damaged crops and harmed people.Experts believe that the shrink of their habitats and the threat of hunting have driven these animals out of the nature reserve.Chen Sufen, an engineer of the Mengla County Forestry Station, was killed in an elephant rampage when she was investigating a field that had been damaged by wild elephants on last November 21. That field was located several km away from the nature reserve. According to local villagers, wild elephants had not appeared in the villages for at least 40 years before that accident occurred.In the past, wild elephants would not walk far beyond the rim of the nature reserve, but now, they seek for food in nearby villages every autumn. The horde that caused the accident is said to be a community of 30 -50 elephants, which had also killed several heads of the local livestock.