Elephants Elephants - Wildpro - Twycross Zoo

Intra-specific aggression: incidence, severity and risk factors
Although not quantified, aggression between zoo elephants is said to be
relatively common. The risk of aggressive interactions has shaped
management regimes to some extent, for instance the use of indoor stalls; a
reluctance to allow elephants to move freely between indoor and outdoor
enclosures at night when keepers are not present, and the use of training (to
allow some degree of intervention). Possible risk factors that have been
highlighted include: a lack of relatedness between group members; mixing
unfamiliar animals and enclosures that do not allow sufficient flight distances,
or places to avoid aggressive conspecifics. Due to the obvious link with
welfare, through injury and social stress, the level of this problem needs to be
quantified, including the severity of aggressive interactions, and the
relationship with the risk factors identified.
Environmental enrichments: use and effectiveness
Environmental enrichment has become a common component of many
elephant husbandry regimes. These encompass both structural (e.g. pools,
mud wallows) and more typical enrichments, which are mainly food-related
(e.g. browse, food-hiding, scatter-feeding). There is, however, very little data
on the effectiveness of such enrichments, nor of elephants’ relative strengths
of preference for different forms, despite purported benefits to elephant
health, behaviour and stress levels. It is thus important that the use of
enrichments are not only quantified, in terms of the different types used and
the frequency of use, but also that scientific assessments are conducted to
determine their effect on elephants.
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