Elephants

A few days ago we visited the Elephant Conservation Centre near Lampang, in northern Thailand. This unique facility promotes the role of the Asian elephant in 'ecotourism' and provides free medical treatment and care for sick elephants from all over Thailand. The plight of Asian elephants is becoming a national concern. Many domesticated animals are treated poorly, and destruction of forests and ivory-trade poaching are placing the wild elephant population in increasing jeopardy. With only 2,000 remaining in the wild in Thailand, the Asian elephant is now classified as an endangered species. At the Conservation Centre we learned that working elephants -- in the forest industry, for example -- typically have a career of about 50 years, and that Thai law requires that elephants be retired and released into the wild at age 61. The elephants can live up to 80 years, and are handled by father-son teams, who see to an animal over the coarse of its life. We fed the elephants bananas and sugar cain, and were amazed at their dry, leathery skin. Inbreeding has become a problem due to low numbers of male elephants, so artificial insemination is now being used to avoid birth defects. The baby elephant pictured below is one of the first born by this method.

This might look like affection between elephants, but the one on the right is trying to steal bananas from the mouth of the other!