guwahati the rise in the death toll of wild animals at kaziranga national park this year was primarily due to one of the worst floods that the state experienced in two decades assam environment and forest minister rockybul hussain on saturday said the water level at kaziranga reached 7646 meter on june 29 which is144 meter above the danger level in the recent floods a total of 559 animal deaths were reported from kaziranga of which 14 were onehorned rhinos one elephant one wild buffalo 475 hog deer 10 swamp deer 18 sambhars 30 wild boars and five porcupines among others even though animals are good swimmers and welladapted to the floodbased ecology of kaziranga wildlife experts say the old diseased and newborns suffered the most in the deluge floods are a natural phenomenon for kazirangas ecology but animals which were old and diseased could not cope up with the deluge and hence died also the newborns which experienced the floods for the first time also formed part of the casualty wildlife biologist of aaranyak m firoz ahmed said the animal deaths were also caused by collision with speeding vehicles as most animals tried to escape the submerged kaziranga by crossing nh37 to reach elevated lands park officials said about 20 animals mostly deer were killed by speeding vehicle in 2004 over 50 animals were killed by speeding vehicles ahmed said the animal casualties this time was far less than what it was in the 1988 and 1998 delugethe minister said in 1988 floods a total of 1203 animals died including 38 rhinos while in the 1998 deluge the animal casualty was 652 and 39 rhinos were killed in the floods