Noorjahan Finally Pregnant » Twycross Zoo

22-10-2008

Not so. They will often tolerate a great deal. The bull elephant 'Tembo' in the famous Chipperfield 'cruelty' video just cowered while he was being hit repeatedly with a shovel.

22-10-2008

Has there been cases of any injury claims? just wondering, because the method of using the ankulus also takes quite a bite of skill not it injury according to this documentery in Thailand's Lampang camp,

22-10-2008

"Not so. They will often tolerate a great deal. The bull elephant 'Tembo' in the famous Chipperfield 'cruelty' video just cowered while he was being hit repeatedly with a shovel."


Yeah I guess
Surprising that is though.

22-10-2008

That is a good example, though I think they are more so unpredictable, there was an elephant in a Kerala Pooram ( procession) spectators can give particular elephants money, when one unlucky did and touch their tusk, then the bull elephant went on a rampage, and ended up killing 3 people, the guys on elephant star, I remember said that he had just come out of his Musth period and they can experince aftershocks, must know what their talking about for they are the owners of majestic bull elephants.

22-10-2008

That's not to say Elephants don't remember mistreatment and do something about it at a later or more opportune moment. There have been many reputed cases of elephants 'bearing grudges' against keepers and mahouts and killing them as a result. But is there any truth in this, or is the elephant that attacks/kills a keeper just being mean on that particular day? We can't ask the elephants unfortunately

23-10-2008

Hello Yassa,

You are misinterpreting my comments here. My comments are not to distinguish between protected and free contact, my comments were based around the fact that most elephant keepers cannot be termed cruel nor are the methods used by them to work with their elephants to be termed cruel.

Elephants can and need to be restrained for several purposes and yes this can be accomplished without physically damaging their charges. The ankus in itself is not a weapon, but a means to demonstrate the elephants in their care what is required.

For sure, captive elephant training and management can be improved and it is exactly for this reason that these days elephant keepers have organised themselves in the Elephant Keepers Management Association.

But I will continue to contest that elephant keepers by their very nature are cruel towards their elephant charges. In this respect, you are talking incidents at perhaps a fraction of all individual zoos keeping elephants in Europe. Besides by acting on assumptions and hearsay ... you are crossing a dangerous line. I prefer to talk and work with the keepers to improve their captive management and not by .. what I am inclined or led to believe. It might help to associate sometime with the EKMA people ....!

23-10-2008

Jelle, we have to agree that we disagree on this topic although, I never said I think elephant keepers by their very nature were cruel!! By the way, i did not misinterpretate your comments, I just wanted to make clear what I think. And I stand behind each word I wrote.

23-10-2008

Origins of taming elephants ( in India and such) work like a child. I saw on this documentery that everytime it behaves badly they said they whack it and something good food and affection, perhaps this was passed down to keepers in the western world?
Then again elephants are beaten truly out of preportion as well. The current king of all elephant processions Thechikottukavu Ramachandran, got into a fight with one of the major shrine holders at the time ( now deceased) Thiruvambadi Chandrashekaran (Late)

I don't know how badly the fight actually was..... but since Raman ran amuck his main mahout punished and whacked him so severly he lost sight in his right eye,

23-10-2008

This is an interesting discussion. Sure, we shouldn't be anthropomorphic here, but then we should be equally mindful that humans don't have a monopoly on distress, and long-term mental trauma as the result of abuse. Elephants don't "sometimes need" to be restrained or controlled in western culture....they were brought here for our curiosity and entertainment, remember, and only recently have these arguably institutionalised individuals still alive in our zoos been brought together in more natural social groupings by progressive minds and organisations working to maintain the captive herd in a way which is currently acceptable (ie breeding instead of cull/logging camp infant imports). Some cultures might rely on elephants to do important work, and this is not a comment of their use of them. Let's just remember that nobody 'needs' to train or restrain and elephant in a zoo, it is the lack of space in many cases that means free contact allows for some aspects of better husbandry and (sometimes) the opportunity to walk your animals outside of their enclosure.

But Yassa is right, free contact involves dominating the animal. Good keepers will be able to do this without losing control or showing outright aggression/violence, but there are always some keepers from time to time who lack the confidence to do this 'well'. Today this is far less so, but the risk of grudges and residual mental triggers to react to keepers following incidents often years before is well known.

Most of the 1980's ZSL asian elephants, (now at Whipsnade and one at chester) exhibit some degree of head-weaving or other behaviour indicative of some mental trauma or stress. Births have been difficult, with stillbirths, calf rejections and adult deaths resulting from some of the pregnancies. Although the captive environment can often be attributed to the current statistics for Asian elephant breeding, it is interesting to note that African elephants have lower incidences of most of the above, and coincidentally tend to be managed in protected contact situations. For those that are managed by free contact, very few of these are trained in the way that young asian elephants are.

23-10-2008

I can where your coming from johnstoni, elephants are in my opinion gods of nature, and where ever should be treated as pretigious guests, as with any other animal,
Many fragments I find the web say that when an animal misbehaves we don't punish it, but rather just when it gives good behaviour rewards are given,

05-11-2008

BBC NEWS | England | Pregnant elephant's check-up

BBC has got a video of Noor Jahan having a check-up

08-05-2009

Noorjahan gets a scan

BBC NEWS | England | Elephant expecting summer birth

08-05-2009

Is there a possible (bull house) to keep a male elephant. Or is there any plan to build an exihibt to keep a male in a few years or so?

08-05-2009

Answer to both is NO. They won't keep a bull for unspecified reasons.

09-05-2009

Ah yes, there had been a few threads on bagging the hell out of Twycross for not trying to take advantage of breeding cows. .....