International Zoo News Vol. 50/2 (No. 323)
Nicholas Gould - Editorial 

On British road maps, the conventional symbol for a zoo is a small image of an elephant. This is frequently misleading, and must cause some disappointment to tourists, since the majority of these symbols mark places which do not keep elephants. But the original choice of symbol is instructive: evidently, to a typical member of the British public, zoos mean elephants. And this is ironic, since no other animals commonly held in zoos have been the subject of such impassioned controversy, both within and outside the zoo community. Within zoos, the question of management systems (in simple terms, hands-on v. hands-off) is paramount, and understandably tends to break out anew every time a keeper is killed by an elephant. (The latest tragic death, at Beekse Bergen Safari Park, took place as I was writing this editorial.) It would be wildly optimistic to hope for a consensus to emerge in the foreseeable future. `The only thing two elephant keepers will agree on,' runs an old zoo saying, `is what a third elephant keeper is doing wrong.'

The broader and more fundamental question, though, relates to what elephants are in zoos for, and whether they should be there at all. Britain's Royal Society for the Protection of Animals (RSPCA) recently entered the field with a number of proposals which amount, in essentials, to a claim that elephants should be phased out in European zoos. Curiously, the expert report commissioned by the charity makes no such demand, and many of its recommendations already form part of the best zoos' practice. Disappointed, presumably, that their researchers hadn't come up with the right – i.e. prejudged – conclusion, the RSPCA published a `summary' whose degree of scientific objectivity is sufficiently indicated by its title – Live Hard, Die Young – How Elephants Suffer in Zoos. It is here that the demand for phasing out is made. Some adverse implications of the original, less emotive, review are discussed below (pp. 86–90) by Paul Rees.

Ideally, Dr Rees's article should be read in conjunction with the Forum section of the latest issue of Oryx [37 (1), 20–25], the journal of Fauna & Flora International. This consists of an article by Dr Rees (`Asian elephants in zoos face global extinction: should zoos accept the inevitable?'), a response by R. Sukumar, and a reply to Sukumar by Rees. It is generally agreed that the current status of Asian elephants in zoos leaves little room for optimism. Of course, it's the good news – successful births – that makes the headlines, in IZN as elsewhere. We need to be reminded just how rare such good news is. Even if every calf currently born survived, it is doubtful whether this would be enough to maintain a self-sufficient population. As things are, infant mortality is high – it was calculated in 1998 that the mean life expectancy of calves born in Europe is only 6.1 years, making at least part of the RSPCA title quoted above seem uncomfortably near the truth. Efforts to increase the birth rate, too, are an uphill struggle. More than 50% of females under 25 years old in the EEP have never been in a potential breeding situation. I've just checked the latest ISIS figures – not infallible, but probably the best available – for the European region: out of 61 zoos, 31 have no males. Of the 49.187.7 individuals listed, 69 are cows in collections with no male. Breeding transfers between zoos once looked like the answer to this; but in practice they are costly, risky, and relatively unsuccessful. The recent triumphs with artificial insemination are an impressive technical achievement, but it's hard not to regard its use as a palliative to disguise the failure to establish normal, natural breeding groups.

To top up the Western zoo population by importing elephants bred in Asia – either in the wild or under human management – would be a way of maintaining numbers, but at the cost of undermining any claim that our zoos have a role in the conservation of the species. There is in any case much force in the argument that supporting in situ breeding would be the most cost-effective way of helping the species. `If Asian elephants did not already exist in zoos,' Dr Rees asks, `would we spend scarce resources developing an ex situ breeding programme with no guarantee of success?'

Professor Sukumar makes a number of points on the positive side. Research in zoos has provided us with a detailed knowledge of elephants' reproductive physiology and biochemistry that will bring future benefits not just to ex situ management but also to conservation in the wild. Zoo elephants have an ambassadorial role and a charisma that few species can equal. The birth of a calf gives a boost to a zoo's gate money that almost makes the achievement self-financing. He also draws attention to the support many zoos give to elephant conservation projects in Asia. Both authors, however, agree on the urgent need to consolidate zoo elephants into fewer, social herds. The problem, of course, will be persuading zoos – especially those who stand to lose their precious, and crowd-pulling, elephants – to cooperate. But no one can dispute that solitary females (or, indeed, males) or female-only groups are unsatisfactory in welfare terms and serve no conservation purpose. It seems obvious that, wherever possible, it would be best to transfer them to zoos with the facilities to maintain good-sized herds. Animals who are too institutionalized to integrate socially should, of course, be allowed to live out their lives in familiar surroundings, as in the case of Bristol Zoo's solitary female who died recently. For them, the ambassadorial role at least provides some raison d'être, and with plenty of human contact and suitable enrichment their lives need not be unduly hard. But for those who are still capable of re-integration into normal elephant society, amalgamation should be the goal.

The primary motive for such a change should be the welfare of the individual animals. Other things being equal, elephants are happier in big groups. `The best enrichment for elephants,' as Dr Rees wrote in an earlier article for IZN [46 (6), 369–371], `is a lot more elephants – of both sexes and all ages.' But putting welfare first carries a bonus. I strongly suspect that – just as with, for example, gorillas – if zoos get the social structure right, breeding will practically take care of itself. Paradoxically, it is only by meeting the welfare needs of the individual that we can realise the zoo population's potential role in the conservation of the species.