North American Asian and African Elephant Populations 2025: Discussion and Speculation

If the audubon zoo were to take young bachelor/non breeding mature bulls, Colonel Tusk at Fort Worth would be a great choice as he hasn't bred any of the young cows there afaik. Kandula at OKC, Nelson and Teddy at Houston, Jet at St louis the Rosamond bull twin calves, and any young males from endangered ark and white oak are all also contenders. The thing is that I'm unsure if the new audubon facility is bull proof already. They never publicly said anything about whether or not they can house males.
 
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Frankie_number_1_fan said:
If Billy leaves LA it'll be to a sanctuary not another zoo. It's unfortunate but he's such an ARA target that there would be outcry and extremely negative PR to both LA and the receiving zoo if he just moved into a bachelor situation elswhere. LA should have the capacity to house multiple bulls, meaning that even if he never breeds they should be able to continue to house him either with hypothetical cows or with another bull/bulls.
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I remain convinced the only way forward and a GFY to the AR activists is to build a breeding group around Billy with young cows from within the current AZA breeding herds.

I remain open to suggestions which herds may be able to provide young cows in the short term! (even if this is as of yet termed 'speculative')?
 
Kifaru Bwana said:
I remain convinced the only way forward and a GFY to the AR activists is to build a breeding group around Billy with young cows from within the current AZA breeding herds.

I remain open to suggestions which herds may be able to provide young cows in the short term! (even if this is as of yet termed 'speculative')?
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Well, the LA Zoo has to be willing. That is why I asked who owns LA Zoo? It seems they are tied to the city somewhat while many zoos are not. Then the issue of finding one or two cows that Billy could reproduce with. That part is hard also.

It would be just better to send Billy to another zoo with the cows and just send in older cows in his place to make the AR and the city board happy.
 
ZCChip said:
It would be just better to send Billy to another zoo with the cows and just send in older cows in his place to make the AR and the city board happy
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Like i said earlier, Audubon would be great for him as they'd have 3 older cows for him to mingle with in his golden years. But I'm sure they'd have to strengthen the fencing a bit for the enclosure to withstand him. As the proverb goes, one door closes, another one opens.
 
The Horse Boy said:
Like i said earlier, Audubon would be great for him as they'd have 3 older cows for him to mingle with in his golden years. But I'm sure they'd have to strengthen the fencing a bit for the enclosure to withstand him. As the proverb goes, one door closes, another one opens.
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I would be shocked if Billy went to Audubon. Their exhibit is a severe downsize from his current one, it would be PR suicide to send him there in its current state.
 
Frankie_number_1_fan said:
I would be shocked if Billy went to Audubon. Their exhibit is a severe downsize from his current one, it would be PR suicide to send him there in its current state.
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I still think audubon is very unlikely to phase out elephants because their enclosure built from the ground up is roughly 10 years old now, and I'm sure they can keep males of any size/age if they choose as I stated earlier. Many articles claim it's state of the art despite its smaller size. I can picture them managing bachelors once their current elder cow trio pass, but that's prob gonna be a while from now.
 
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The Horse Boy said:
Like i said earlier, Audubon would be great for him as they'd have 3 older cows for him to mingle with in his golden years. But I'm sure they'd have to strengthen the fencing a bit for the enclosure to withstand him. As the proverb goes, one door closes, another one opens.
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that would be a bad choice. There is already an older cow at LA Zoo. Billy is totally unrepresentative with his genetics so he’s a fresh breath of genetics we need. There is no need to waste him with additional older cows.
 
ZCChip said:
that would be a bad choice. There is already an older cow at LA Zoo. Billy is totally unrepresentative with his genetics so he’s a fresh breath of genetics we need. There is no need to waste him with additional older cows.
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Potentially they could take him to San Antonio to breed younger cows when their new elephant complex opens. Just a thought.
 
The Horse Boy said:
Potentially they could take him to San Antonio to breed younger cows when their new elephant complex opens. Just a thought.
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We will have to wait for the announcements in the future. It is hard to guess what is going to happen after so much history nowadays especially with LA Zoo. That issue has been going on for decades!
 
ZCChip said:
We will have to wait for the announcements in the future. It is hard to guess what is going to happen after so much history nowadays especially with LA Zoo. That issue has been going on for decades!
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Well then billy can stay at LA if it's the safest road to take, then they can take a herd split from houston white oak and even st louis, then San antonio, Tulsa, Miami, Dickerson Park, Audubon, Busch Gardens, or even Oregon can take imports from other countries including an ALS matriline for Asians. Bronx and Little Rock may also be candidates for such endeavors.
 
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ZCChip said:
Well, the LA Zoo has to be willing. That is why I asked who owns LA Zoo? It seems they are tied to the city somewhat while many zoos are not.
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The zoo is directly managed by the city of LA. Hence my doubt on whether elephants will continue much longer. The ARs are putting a lot of pressure on with the bad PR, even if much of it is falsehoods. I would not hold my breath on getting more elephants in there.
 
Great Argus said:
The zoo is directly managed by the city of LA. Hence my doubt on whether elephants will continue much longer. The ARs are putting a lot of pressure on with the bad PR, even if much of it is falsehoods. I would not hold my breath on getting more elephants in there.
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I guess LA is the American AZA facility that is not non profit. And the city government should repeal their law regarding imports IMHO
 
Great Argus said:
This keeps being referred to yet I can find nothing about it online - can someone link to a page or document or was this speculation that's now being quoted as fact?
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It was mentioned here by @E Maximus last year. I have no idea of the details or if any legal issues are specifically related to Canada (as was the context of the original conversation).
E Maximus said:
As for a split of herds LA is out of the picture due to legal constraints
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If phoenix decided to continue with asian elephants, i'm positive they would have gladly taken an import after redoing the current facility. But we can't change the past, so they seem pretty serious they will abandon holding the species in favor of Indian rhinos once indu passes.
 
The Horse Boy said:
That way LA can take new herd imports to compensate for Billy being lonely (if tina passes soon) no problem.
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Would make sense and be ideal, however can be difficult because of activists and government. It is hypocritical of them because Billy being alone was the sole reasoning for controversy (maybe as well as the old exhibit). It's a bummer because imo I find Elephants of Asia to be a major improvement and adequate and it is mind boggling that it still gets backlash from activists. At the end, its just never winning with these guys unless its sending animals to an overrated sanctuary.
 
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