Elephant show at Kolmården 2014

The elephant show at Kolmården in 2014. The elephant shown here is Saba which was the only elephant used this time. Which elephant(s) they used varied and they also regularly used two or three elephants at the same time. During the show they talked about how they managed and trained the elephants, and showed some examples. They also showed some natural behaviours, for example pulling logs and finding small pieces of fruit with the trunk.

This kind of elephant show is not displayed anymore, since a couple of years the elephants are managed with protected contact, meaning that they can’t have a show like this. Instead, they put up a fence in the middle of the elephant venue. Now they display some training methods with the elephants on one side and the keepers on the other side of the fence. It’s quite hard to get a good view since the fence (and the elephants) is quite far away from the audience.

One thing that I didn’t like with the old elephant show (as with most of the shows in the park) is that the person speaking is an actor with no knowledge about the animals. The actor just talks from a script, which means that they say exactly the same thing every time without knowing what they are talking about. I would have preferred to have a keeper or biologist talking instead, meaning that they could vary what they say from time to time, as they are knowing what they are talking about and can change depending on the situation. Then it would be more interesting to see the show several times as it would not be exact the same every time. Longer back in time (10 years or so) all shows were hosted by keepers or biologists instead of actors, making them much more interesting.