Chester Zoo Elephants????

I personally think the only parent/child separation should be with species where they frequently eat their own young, like with some species of fish and amphibian. With these animals, the parents usually leave as soon as they have given birth/spawned, so again, replicating nature is best
 
Elephants

If elephants are bred in captivity they should not ever be separated from their female young. As far as the males are concerned, only when they are ready and that is FAR from 1 or 2 years of age, which is a very common and very cruel practice in many circuses and zoos.
 
Richie said:
It is a horrible way to treat a mother animal...It is the protocol for being safe. Many places in the US do it, but not all. I believe that they have the fewest problems in the venues where things are kept as "natural" as possible. We must learn to be a kinder species.
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You also need to be realistic though. While family groups with related animals to help a calm birth process is the ideal for all zoo elephants, in some zoos this is not always a possible situation with all elephants. In the Whipsnade case, the female was born at another Zoo and was moved to Whipsnade for practical reasons, because of handling problems. So she did not have any relatives in the Whipsnade group, while it was also a first birth for her and they did not know how she would react. I'm sure you're aware first time mothers are sometimes aggressive to their calves(the Chester female Thi who is currently expecting shortly, was also violent to her first calf and killed it after birth) and chaining avoids that. There is really no other way keepers can intercept if the mother becomes agigated or aggressive to her newborn.

Chaining an elephant for a birth may seem harsh and undignified, at least to us, but for an elephant that is accustomed to being routinely chained at intervals, its just part of her normal life and probably no more stressful than at any other time. Whipsnade now have a successful outcome for mother and calf whereas there could have been another outcome had chains not been used. I agree there is no point in chaining females that have already proved to be good mothers though, or where this is a good herd structure to provide the necessary support/atmosphere.
 
I agree that it was not ideal to chain Karishma when she was giving birth to little George, however, if she had not been shackled for the birth and proceeded to attack or even kill the calf I don't think I would have liked to be a keeper present and have to go in and sort it out as this also would have been very dangerous for the keepers concerned. It is good that people are concerned about the welfare of the elephants, I personally am very fond of Karishma and her half sister Tara who I have had the greatest pleasure of watching them grow from babies into the fine young ladies that they now are, so please do not loose any respect for Z.S.L. over this, Yes some would say it was stressful and humiliating for the elephant, could the same not be said for a human young lady giving birth to a baby in a maternity ward?
 
elephants

It is true that there are elephants who attempt to kill their young and I imagine that each case is different. In Portland, where more births had taken place than anywhere else for a long time, they left the elephants together to give birth and I don't believe there were any of the fatalities that happened in other places where the chaining protocol took place. Unfortunately, they too, took the babies from the mothers to sell, trade to place elsewhere and that really lowered, at least, my opinion of their program. I don't know all the answers and I don't think anyone else does either. I just feel that we, as humans and caretakers, have to honestly do what is best for the animals we keep captive for their sake and not just ours. Elephants are a very highly evolved life form and more and more is being learned about their social structure and other behaviors all the time. Someday we will do what is right for them....At least I hope we will.
 
Richie said:
In Portland, where more births had taken place than anywhere else for a long time, they left the elephants together to give birth and I don't believe there were any of the fatalities that happened in other places where the chaining protocol took place.
Is this because this is a well established group with related animals in the group? although I was surprised that Portland despite their successful past Elephant breeding record, don't seem to have a large or related family-type group nowadays. Is that because calves have been removed young?
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TARZAN said:
Yes some would say it was stressful and humiliating for the elephant, could the same not be said for a human young lady giving birth to a baby in a maternity ward?
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Some people may say it looks stressful and humiliating for the elephant-but is it really? You can't ask the Elephant, I know, but I would query that as elephants are used to being confined in this way. I am not actively supporting this method, but pointing out it may not actually be what it appears for the Elephant itself.
 
I do believe that your conjecture is correct about the reason for not having an extensive family group was that they took their babies from them. If you want to read what that was like for the elephants, read the book "Jumbo Ghosts" It was written by the man who was the veterinarian there, in Portland, at the time. It is horrifically eye opening. Nobody knows what animals think, we can only guess and see their reactions to the environment around them. Elephants are very highly evolved and deserve much more respect than they have been given. I saw a video of BABY elephants being BROKEN in Thailand and being beaten and stuck with sharp objects until their spirit was broken and they just gave up fighting for their lives. It was one of the worst things I have ever seen. It was torture, and justified by the people who did it for their own reasons and needs. Needless to say, it made us very hesitant about visiting Thailand until such things stop.
 
Richie said:
I do believe that your conjecture is correct about the reason for not having an extensive family group was that they took their babies from them. If you want to read what that was like for the elephants, read the book "Jumbo Ghosts" It was written by the man who was the veterinarian there, in Portland, at the time. It is horrifically eye opening. Nobody knows what animals think, we can only guess and see their reactions to the environment around them. Elephants are very highly evolved and deserve much more respect than they have been given. I saw a video of BABY elephants being BROKEN in Thailand and being beaten and stuck with sharp objects until their spirit was broken and they just gave up fighting for their lives. It was one of the worst things I have ever seen. It was torture, and justified by the people who did it for their own reasons and needs. Needless to say, it made us very hesitant about visiting Thailand until such things stop.
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And what about the Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey elephant" conservation center", a similar scenario I would say.
 
I am sure you are right. I have a friend who was there when they were tearing a baby from its mother and she described one of the saddest things one could imagine. I wrote against their policy and its cruelty and they flipped and tried their best to discredit what I said. They could not of course, because when you blind yourself to the truth and see only what you want to see, and that is what benefits you and hurts everything else, you can make yourself as self-righteous as you wish. It still, however, does not make your actions cruel and disgusting.
Elephants love and keep their young, despite what the circus wants....I don't thing the needs of the circus assuage the pain of the mother elephant when she sees her child being dragged away from her.
 
Richie said:
I am sure you are right. I have a friend who was there when they were tearing a baby from its mother and she described one of the saddest things one could imagine. I wrote against their policy and its cruelty and they flipped and tried their best to discredit what I said. They could not of course, because when you blind yourself to the truth and see only what you want to see, and that is what benefits you and hurts everything else, you can make yourself as self-righteous as you wish. It still, however, does not make your actions cruel and disgusting.
Elephants love and keep their young, despite what the circus wants....I don't thing the needs of the circus assuage the pain of the mother elephant when she sees her child being dragged away from her.
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Yes and get the hook poked into her for having the nerve to protest about her off spring being taken away to be flogged and electrocuted all in the name of good honest family entertainment, it makes my f. ing blood boil.
 
Re Whipsnade - I do not think there is any justification for chaining Karishma during her birth. True, she does not have any related females in the herd there, but as far as I know she has bonded very well with Mya and Aziza, who are both very experienced with babys (Aziza being a 3-times-mother and Mya being the aunt for Aziza`s calves). If you look at experiences from other zoos, unrelated, experienced, bonded females do as well as midwifes then related ones.

Actually, Thi from Chester (killed the first calf and rejected the second) only raised her third calf, Sithami, because unrelated female Sheba was present during birth, supported Thi and teached her being a mother. Putting Karishma with Mya and Aziza for the birth may not have been risk-free, but the odds would have been good. Plus, it seems chaining females and restricting their movements so much can cause birth complications and even stillbirths. Unchained females have a lesser stillbirth rate and fewer rejections happen, I have seen a study about this.

Does anyone really know for sure that the 2 experienced females at Whipsnade are no longer chained for their births? I wouldn`t be so sure about this.
 
zoo elephant births

Zoos, like schools and other institutions, often make the rules more important than the child or animal that the rule is supposed to serve, so if chaining is the "protocol" I don't think it matters whether the animal is a primipara or not. I don't know very much about that zoo, but, like I said, rules very often are rules.
 
Yassa said:
Does anyone really know for sure that the 2 experienced females at Whipsnade are no longer chained for their births? I wouldn`t be so sure about this.
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No, I wondered about that too.

I believe one factor which may have caused them to implement chaining with Karishma was because another first time female, 'Noorjahan' at Twycross was apparently aggressive toward her calf when it was born last year, and this would have made the Whipsnade staff more cautious- that's only my feeling though.

The two adult females at Twycross were also chained for the birth of their first(and so far only) calves.
 
Is there any chance those of you that want to discuss the chaining of Elephants start a new thread as,Chester does not chain its Elephants when they give birth and the discussion has no place on a thread about when the next Elephant birth will happen at Chester.

Rant over!!!!
 
This thread has been moved as it has been pointed out to me that Chester zoo NEVER has or NEVER WILL chain any of their elephants.
Therefore the thread has been moved to avoid any confusion.
 
Actually Kiang, your statement is not true. Thi was chained at least during her second birth (Karha) and the keepers prevented her from killing her, though she rejected it. She was planned to be chained for Sithami`s birth too but labor began in the morning after she had been just released from the chaines into the herd, and then she gave birth in the herd and Sheba took care of all issues much better then any human could have.
 
Yassa said:
Actually Kiang, your statement is not true. Thi was chained at least during her second birth (Karha) and the keepers prevented her from killing her, though she rejected it. She was planned to be chained for Sithami`s birth too but labor began in the morning after she had been just released from the chaines into the herd, and then she gave birth in the herd and Sheba took care of all issues much better then any human could have.
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Yassa and all members, my apologies, my wording is wrong.
The management at Chester have said through another member here it is "something the zoo does not do".
I have interpreted incorrectly, apologies for the misunderstanding on my part.
 
Chester may well have chained Elephants in the past,but the policy now is not to chain them at all!!!
 
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