Elephants Elephants - Wildpro - Twycross Zoo

to North America in 1796 and the first African in 1804 (Schulte 2000). In those
times elephants moved frequently between zoos and circuses and were
routinely trained to perform tricks, various characters having made the annuls
of animal history (Eltringham 1982) (Carrington 1962) [Menageries 1931 #30].
Zoos were very much consumers of elephants and an interesting account of
the capture of African forest elephants for the Bronx Zoo in 1946 is given by
William Bridges. This is of particular interest as the elephants came from the
then Belgium Congo (now DRC) which was the only African country to train
and domesticate elephants in recent times (Bridges 1947).
Currently captive management of elephants in India comes under four
categories (Krishnamurthy 1998);
• In logging camps maintained by state forestry departments: working
elephants, particularly logging. Some provide extensive environments
for their animals and welfare is good and the animal’s breed (Kurt
1995).
• In zoological parks: the Central Zoo Authority of India sets husbandry
standards.
• In temples: these tend to be tethered and fed a monotonous diet and do
not have regular health care.
• Under private ownership: this constitutes the majority of captive
elephants and they may change hands frequently.
An elephant welfare association has recently formed in India and has
published a handbook for mahouts and organises training programmes
(Namboodiri 1997).
Until recently few elephants were bred in zoos, mainly because bulls were
rarely kept. Elephants have been bred infrequently in circuses, the first
recorded birth in the USA being in 1880. European zoos which bred elephants
in the early years of the 20 th century were Vienna (in 1906), Berlin and
Copenhagen. By 1931 only nine animals had been born in European
collections, three of those in Copenhagen (Crandall 1964). The first African
birth was in Munich in 1943. The first accounts of handrearing were from
Rome zoo in 1948 and 1950. Using data from the International Zoo Yearbook,
in 1982, it was estimated that 150 collections exhibited 500 elephants and of
these only 30 had been captive born in the previous 10 years of which 21 had
survived; not a record for zoos to be proud of (Wait 1983). From the mid
1980s zoos started taking elephant breeding more seriously and information
on this is provided in subsequent sections.
3.2 General Guidance on Health and Welfare in Captivity
Animal welfare is notoriously difficult to define (Broom 1996) (Fraser et al
1997) (Stafleu et al 1996), it is also difficult to measure in that it is difficult to
assess the relative qualitative and quantitative comparisons of two different
environments (Mason and Mendl 1993). One definition commonly used is
that of Broom where the welfare of an animal is defined as its state as regards
its attempts to cope with its environment. This state includes its health, physical
and mental states and biological fitness. Good animal welfare implies both
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