According to Melbourne Zoo, Mali is small for a female elephant and they think she’ll stay that way as she’s nearing adulthood. She must take after her mother, who at 15 years of age, weighed half a tonne less than Num Oi did at the same age.
@Yoshistar888 Mali’s birth was all over the New Zealand news too. Taronga Zoo might have had the first elephant born in Australia; but Mali was the first female and the first through AI.
Even with all the recent stalling, it’s likely Mali will give birth to the first member of the second generation of elephants born in Australia. With Dokoon and Kulab needing to be given priority for breeding, I imagine this won’t be until Mali’s mid to late teens - and when the herd has been relocated to Werribee.
@Zoofan15 I'm not a person that usually spends at lot of time at the elephants but Mali was so adorable that day, using her trunk, she looks like an old lady yet shes only 10 years old!
@Yoshistar888 It’s always surprises me how quickly such a long lived animal grows up. Even at age four, Mali (and others of her species) no longer looked calf like - just smaller versions of the adults they’d grow into. Many zoos acquired elephants at four years of age e.g. Ma Schwe, Kashin etc. at Auckland Zoo. Too young to leave their herds from a social perspective of course.
