BANGKOK (Reuters) - A vital operation on an elephant which stepped on a landmine has been postponed because the animal has become distressed by hundreds of well-wishers, a Thai animal clinic said on Thursday. The clinic, in Lampang province 600 km (366 miles) north of Bankgok, had intended to amputate the front left leg of Motala, a 38-year-old cow elephant, on Wednesday. But so many animal lovers had arrived in recent days to see the elephant that the operation had to be delayed because she was too weak and needed to regain strength. Motala, weighing more than four tonnes, stepped on a landmine in the jungle in Myanmar on August 15 and has become a national celebrity this week after newspapers reported her plight. „The weakness is the result of the bad wound and stress room being disturbed by so many well-wishers,“ said a vet at the clinic who declined to be identified. „We have had to limit visits to the elephant,“ he said. On Monday, the clinic appealed for money and advice on how to amputate an elephant‘s leg since this would be the first recorded instance of such an operation in Thailand, where the animals, national symbols, are used to haul logs and for other heavy work. Thousands of landmines and booby traps have been planted in the Myanmar jungles by ethnic rebels waging war against the military government in the Myanmar capital, Yangon.