The author certainly seems pleased about getting front page. I quote her twitter status: "Two page leads… not to toot my own horn but not bad for my first official freelance weekend. I did accidentally break my toe by dropping a scented candle on it from a great height though which is helping me to stay humble." https://twitter.com/horton_official/status/1406312554620755970
To be honest, elephants don't exactly thrive in captivity. Maybe it is time to consider their future! You could fit an awful lot of birds, reptiles, amphibians even mammals on the footprint of an elephant enclosure! Everywhere, except London of course!!
A quick gander at who she follows on Twitter supports that. Could somebody check their website and figure out if they ever published a retraction when this information came out? I would, but I find them so full of garbage (aside from the occasional valid point), I don't particularly want to.
I personally am wondering that when they talk about the 'average lifespan' of an elephant in captivity if they factored in EEHV deaths, as I reckon that significantly pulls down the average
These self appointed rigtheous "journos" are hardly interested in the truth. It might be worthwhile to send a letter of complaint relating to misrepresentation of the facts, not having a clue whatsoever about good newspaper articles are about and the fact the author is biased and has ties to animal welfarist groups exposing their double standards. Personally, I think both the journalist and editorial team are fit for a royal sack off.
Its a common trick of animal rights groups to mention average age of elephants in captivity often including those that dns, while reporting the oldest wild animal ages or take wild studies that do not include young elephants that may have passed.
The statistics are getting better, no doubt, but it will likely be never as good as a lot of animals. However, it is incredibly unlikely that the report will recommend a complete ban. And the idea that only a quarter of us think elephants (as Born Free quoted) should be kept in UK zoos is ludicrous - if that were the case, shouldn't zoos without elephants get higher visitor numbers than those that do? Chester Zoo (which has elephants) is the most-visited attraction outside London in the UK.
I definitely agree with the second point you make but I'm very much in the minority that hold that view on zoochat. Unfortunately Kifaru the Daily Mail is hardly known for its stellar journalism or concerns about accuracy and truth in reporting so I don't think a complaint would make much of a difference. The fact that Chester zoo and Goldsmith have both released a statement on the issue is probably more than enough and I wouldn't be suprised if she is contacted by someone within the government about this. Incidentally she also has a lot of friends within the celebrity scientist world who shared the article on their twitters including Dr Ben Garrod (who I really do not like anyway , long story).
I have yet to see the evidence of these in depth wild populations age-sex-longevity and average survival in protected and unprotected habitats studies and data sets that would enable us to come up with any definite answers within this debate / discourse. I would concur the evidence is not so B/W as some elephant population scientists will have us believe. I wonder if they include poaching deaths or other accidental human impacted elephant demise is really included in their studies of average longevity, actual age and actual survivability in the wilds of various age / sex classes including for calves, juveniles, sub adults, adults and elderly or ancients. I would think the end net results are far removed from the exaggerated numbers and ages quoted and the pick and choose strategy of animal welfarists when quoting individual ages for captive elephants and early sometimes unexpectedly and unfortunate so deaths of calves and juveniles in captivity. It would take a gargantuesque effort on the part of a field researcher to create reliable and full and total data on elephant births and deaths within their populations under study and come to relevant and verifiable conclusions on average lifespans while also including the catastrophic and dramatic elephant deaths in them. As I said so, I do not believe even a Cynthia Moss of this tradition has that reliable a data set on the Amboseli elephants. To be relevant it would require also to offset her data to other elephant populations not just in Kenya, but across their entire range. At present, I am damned to believe those data exist to make such definite and full conclusions. Even when quoting elephant numbers across Africa there is a good margin of error in the current most basic population numbers' data and the numbers quoted for African elephant numbers in the past may even have been overestimates of numbers ... and more likely based on the statistical models potential guesstimates rather than actual numbers. ATM the jury remains out. What I do know is that average captive or wild age are probably inbetween the 35-45 age bracket ranges both under captive and wild conditions, and ignoring those wider off the mark in both under aged early deaths and older or ancient age elderly elephants.
Stopping imports or breeding would cause more harm to elephant families. It also be very difficult to find new homes for all the Elephant herds in the UK. I think they should introduce strick rules on minimum outdoor and indoor areas for any new elephant exhibit and also I think these should be applied to allncurrent holders, but with say a 10 year period to either enlarge or move the elephants.
Would it be worth sending a message to the Mail saying that someone wrote an intentionally misleading article based on false information?
I can't see what difference that would make or that it would even be listened to. I mean this is a tabloid newspaper whose articles are basically all based on false information.
Only if you've got the money to fight a potential libel case . . . More seriously, the appropriate complaint would be to the Press Complaints Commission (or whatever it's currently called) but I'm not sure what the grounds of complaint would be. EDIT: It's now IPSO and the complaint would be under Clause 1 (Accuracy).
@SHAVINGTONZOO this is annoyingly not the first time, that a Newspaper has published an article that is untrue. Sometimes I think the Newspapers exaggerate of fabricate stories to entice the public to purchase their paper!! I can gurantee that if I sent the News an article stating that My Mum is a Gorilla and my Dad is a Chimp it would be published.
