Elephant Voices

Theresa Siskind St Petersburg FL, on 02 Apr 2008

Very poignant. Thank you for this report.

Anna, on 03 Apr 2008

Poignant and very telling how the juvenile elephants learn and prepare for adult life. I think it very similar to the human never ending debate regarding nature versus nurture that you rightly say is a bit of both. But like you say the effect on the life of the male elephant from little calf to adolescence without the guidance and presence of the older and also the breading musth males must have been very telling after the decades of poaching all around Africa. I think these little guys need more luck then what is already needed to survive to the later stages of their life’s, (it is very telling how many times we can see the comparison with our own human society on a day to day basis).

ElephantVoices, on 04 Apr 2008

Hi Christine - we definitely need to rethink how we handle elephants in captivity - it is all wrong the way elephants are separated from friends and family and moved about like so much produce!The trouble is that the currency for elephants in captivity tends to have more to do with profit than with education, conservation or with the interests of the individuals.

ElephantVoices, on 04 Apr 2008

Hi Anna, Yes, there are so many similarities between elephants and ourselves. And, you are correct about the males needing even more luck….with their tusks being 7 times the weight of female tusks of the same age, they are always the first target.

Amy, on 04 Apr 2008

Last week’s (Washington) City Paper ran a story about Kandula that ignores these issues — because the zoo ignores them.
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/display.php?id=34788

The story is just plain creepy. The zoo portrays Kandula as a savior for the species — what a misnomer. He may never have a chance to mate — they’re interested in his sperm, not a normal life for him — and any calves he sires will stay in zoos, not be released to the wild.

Sheryl — I too watch Kandula with great sadness. He’s growing up in a dysfunctional situation and has a dreary future ahead of him, since zoos are ill-equipped to house and care for bulls.

And Sheryl — the zoo’s new elephant exhibit may be a giant waste of money. It’s supposed to cost $60 million — the most any elephant exhibit has cost — but will be only 4 acres. Considering that those 4 acres include the house and will be divided up into different areas, you’re basically back to a conventional exhibit dressed up in fancy clothes. And when the zoo touts how “naturalistic” the exhibit will be, take a close look at it — it may look naturalistic to us but not BE naturalistic for the elephants.

sheryl, washington dc, on 04 Apr 2008

Amy, I think you’re selling the zoo a little short on the Elephant Trails project. The house isn’t going to be expanded, just radically changed on the inside and the eles will get most of that four acres as yard space and a half mile walking trail - something they sorely need.

As for releasing a captive-born and bred elephant into the wild - that’s a really bad idea. Releasing any captive-born and bred animal into the wild in the current situation is a bad idea because they’ll have to compete for scarce resources and they’ll likely lose. The idea behind the zoo’s elephant breeding program is to create a captive population with high genetic diversity as a back up for if/when wild populations disappear. Sadly, the conservation efforts of most AZA-accredited zoos now are to create back up populations because we’re destroying habitat and species faster than we even know. And that makes me sad. Incredibly sad. I’ll probably never see an elephant in the wild, but I can see some at a zoo where I know they are given the best possible care and THAT makes me care about what happens to them. BTW, the zoo has further plans to destroy some of the parking lots and build a structure - upwards - so the land that was once parking lots can be converted into animal habitat. Trust me, this is a better place for Kandula, Shanthi and Ambika than at the Ringling breeding facility in Florida. I understand your concerns, believe me, but we’re looking at a grim future for any species on earth but our own - this may be the only way to preserve some of the non-human animals.

s.

Amy, on 06 Apr 2008

Sheryl — I beg to differ.

The 4-acre figure includes the house, the space for visitors, etc. It will be divided up into different areas so it is questionable how much space the elephants themselves will actually have.

I wasn’t suggesting that zoos release captive-bred and born elephants to the wild. What I am suggesting is that as long as zoos continue to put tens of millions of dollars into exhibits that are still too small (and 4 acres is too small) and breeding programs that fail more than they succeed, they are perpetuating the same entertainment-based model they have been using since they began about 200 years ago.

Zoos could better spend their money on a new model created by the two sanctuaries, The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee and PAWS. The National Zoo, for instance, has hundreds of acres of land at its Front Royal campus. Why don’t they create an elephant preserve there? Forget all the fancy dressing and let them live as close to a natural life as possible. Stop trying to orchestrate “natural” behaviors and let them just live. I bet before you know it you’d have healthier, happier elephants and they’d breed on their own.

Large animals like elephants simply do not belong in urban zoos where land is limited. And zoos have no research that shows that seeing such animals close up actually motivates people to do something for them. They may like seeing them, they may come away with better attitudes about wildlife but they don’t necessarily do anything about it.

It’s sad, too, that instead of trying to do real conservation — tackle the problems of habitat destruction, for instance — zoos bemoan the phenomenon — and then use it as a way to raise money for themselves. You should examine their statements more closely. Overpopulation, habitat destruction, etc., are incredibly tough problems to tackle but zoos get off incredibly easy when no one questions how real their commitment to the values they espouse actually is. Zoos could do a LOT more to instigate positive change than they do now.

As to the care elephants receive in the zoo: A lot of the care they receive is for conditions — arthritis, foot and joint problems, just to name a couple — caused by the small spaces and hard surfaces of the zoo environment itself. I bet elephants living in a preserve at Front Royal would have a lot less of those problems.

As to the National Zoo vs. Ringling: Ringling has given the zoo more than $300,000 in grants to study reproduction and the herpes virus. Just how deep do those ties go? That would be interesting to find out.

sheryl, washington dc, on 07 Apr 2008

Wow. I think it’s damned pointless for me to continue in the face of such overwhelming cynicism. I know the National Zoo pretty well, in fact, my employer is the National Academy of Sciences and we wrote a little report in 2004-05 about the National Zoo that was harshly critical. I didn’t say it’s a perfect solution, but neither are those sanctuaries you mention - the elephants aren’t breeding there, either. As for Front Royal, it’s in the piedmont at a considerably higher elevation than the District.

The zoo no longer accepts funds from Ringling and $300,000 isn’t a lot considering the cost of the Asia Trail and Elephant Trails projects. But, whatever. Keep your cynicism. I’m going to continue my volunteer work there and try to convince people to change their lives to save what we can of our wildlife.

s.

Marie, on 07 Apr 2008

I also volunteer at a zoo with our two wonderful Asian Elephants and I am concerned about the survival of elephants in the wild too. I think zoos could be good places to start conservation in. Yes, they were at first built for entertainment but now many zoos are trying to change by giving elephants more naturalistic lives as best as they can and trying to spread the message of conservation around to the public who normally can’t see elephants in the wild. Not everyone can go to Africa and Asia to see the wild elephants. I do not want to fight over weither elephants should only be in the wild or not. We need to stop this fighting and use the information we get about the elephant from the wild and in captivity ( in captivity I mean zoo and places who dont abuse their elephants and give the best care as possible to them in captivity; mimicing as best as they can the elephants natural habitat and behaviors)and compromise what ever we can get out of all these elephant studies and save the elephants from extinction.