Baraza

Category: Africa, Emergency appeals, Ivory, bushmeat, chimpanzee, drought, elephants, poaching, wildlife trade, wildlifedirect | Date: Aug 05 2009 | By: Maina

In the past week or so, our bloggers have been reporting some tough situations in their areas of work. From death of elephants to financial crises and other ravages of drought and the global economic crisis.

CERCOPAN of Nigeria were last week tittering on the edge of a financial cliff as they needed to raise US$ 3,333 in order to keep their premises and continue rescuing primates caught up in the deep rooted west African bushmeat trade. They launched an appeal for funds and WildlifeDirect has been helping them spread the word. As of today, they had raised US$1395 which is quite impressive. They however need some US$1,938 before the end of August to secure the 120 primates’ only place of sanctuary from the bushmeat insanity.

The Amboseli Trust for Elephants (ATE) on Kenya is also facing a crisis with some of the most known African Elephants in the world starting to die because of the severe drought that is bringing Kenya and other east African states to their knees. They have lost valuable matriachs - and old friends - such as Echo, Grace, Isis, Leticia, Lucia, Odile, Ulla and Xenia in the last 1 year.  Echo, Isis, Leticia and Ulla have been matriarchs of their families since the 1970s. But the human hand is also dealing a blow to elephant conservation.

Poaching is taking out the large bulls. In the last 10 days three more big males have been killed. One, Ebenezer, had his tusks cut out with a power saw. That should send a warning alarm to wildlife authorities in Africa - today’s poachers are more advanced in their brutality.

To fight these poachers, ATE has supported two ranger bases in Amboseli area. Now they need a third and need to raise US$ 10,000 to fund building the base and to keep it running. Please help them.

The bushmeat trade in western Africa is really messy and two young victims of this grim trade have arrived at Tacugama in Sierra Leone. This is in addition to the three that arrived recently and all together Tacugama has in their care 96 orphaned chimps. They are, quite literally, bursting at their seems with chimp orphans. That makes it all the more needy for funds to rehabilitate these little ones until they are ready to get back into the forest and fend for themselves. You would help them wouldn’t you?

While all this is going on, we at WildlifeDirect want to keep this channel open so that you and your friends can respond to these emergencies and day to day needs of the wildlife of Africa, Asia and South America.  We also need your direct support so that we can pay Internet bills, electricity, rent and staff who keep these blogs working. We want you to continue enjoying the happy moments with our bloggers. To laugh with them, and to cry with them when times are hard. After all, you don’t want to wake up one morning and find that there is no WildlifeDirect. I believe you would be worried about all the poor defenseless wildlife that have been benefiting from the existence of WildlifeDirect. Please don’t let this happen.

Tags: Africa, bushmeat, chimp, DRC, drought, elephants, Kenya, Nigeria, poaching, wildlife trade, wildlifedirect

3 responses so far

Category: Africa, Ivory, elephants | Date: Jul 31 2009 | By: paula

“Africa and Asian elephants are in for tough times ahead” says Iain Douglas-Hamilton of Save the Elephants. After the ivory sales last year, elephant poaching has increased. Many conservationists believe it is being fueled by the demand in Eastern countries – yet nobody dares to say this. The money raised from the sales of ivory was supposed to go into elephant conservation. Some people who dare to call themselves conservationists argued that the ban on ivory was wrong, the burn was wasteful, and that the sale of ivory was the best way to generate funds and support for elephant conservation.  Well, how come elephants are worse off today than they were before the sales?

And, how come ivory is now selling at US$ 1,888/kg in Vietnam? Isn’t it obvious that the one off sale has stimulated demand and prices are rising? Now even the IUCN is saying that elephantas are in trouble …but they are confining their concerns to Asian elephants …why??

It’s now apparent that the four southern African countries that sold their ivory to China and Japan were duped – their stock piles fetched prices in the range of 100 – 120$/kg! The real value of ivory in eastern markets is at least ten times this. Southern African countries were cheated by the East - but I’m not feeling sorry for them!

Even more worrying however that the CITES conference that approved the one off sale did so on condition of a 9 year moratorium. Kenya led that campaign and the conference adopted it. But they made a MASSIVE BLUNDER. The wording of the agreement only binds the countries that sold their stocks. It does not include countries like Sudan, Tanzania and Zambia that have massive (and some illegally acquired) stockpiles . With renewed demand in Asia, these countries are likely to demand for sales of their stockpiles too at the next CITES conference.

Iain Douglas–Hamilton and I discussed this problem with his researchers at his house last night. He showed me the maps of elephant killings in Kenya in 2008 – the image is frightening. the country is covered in dots- each one representing a dead elephant. He says it isn’t as bad as it was in the 1960,s but I reminded him that back then we had ten times as many elephants. Based on genetic evidence from tusks, Sam Wasser believes that the proportion of elephants we are losing today is far greater than any time in history.

I met Iain about 30 year ago when as a young volunteer recruited to measure Kenya’s ivory stockpile. It as a morbid job but we had to know what was happening. We weighed and measured every single tusk and estimated the age of the elephant that had died. We processed 30 tons of ivory in 2 days. The information showed us that poachers were going for younger and younger animals. At that point, I had never seen an elephant in the wild, but I was so disgusted with the killings and disillusioned about the future of elephants that I turned down a project on ele’s and went on to study primates. Later I did study elephants for my PhD, when the ivory ban was working and guns had fallen silent.

These are the 30 tons of ivory that I measured in 1989. Kenya’s president burned the lot and the world praised him for it.

Sadly, those guns are back in action and Africa’s elephants are once again at risk because we were persuaded by greedy people to run a risky experiment.

It feels like the precautionary principle has gone extinct.  If we aren’t careful, we will soon be seeing the nightmarish scenes of hacked off faces of elephants that dominated the conservation news in the 1980’s.

Iain asked me ‘what are we going to do about it?” and I looked at him blankly, I didn’t have an answer.

What would you have replied - what can we do?

Tags: China, elephant poaching, elephants, Ivory, Kenya, Samburu, stockpiles, Tsavo

5 responses so far

Category: Africa, Emergencies, elephants | Date: May 22 2009 | By: Maina

The most severe drought ever to hit Mali in the 29 years is devastating the 400 or so desert elephants resident in Gourma district to the southeast of Timbuktu. We have recieved a press release from the Save the Elephants organization informing us of this crisis and we are sharing it with all that we know.

The pictures accompanying the press release are heartbreaking. Dead elephants lying around the parched dust fields to juvenile elephants lying down to die. The drought is intense, but you can help by donating in the Save the Elephants website. Save the elephants will soon start blogging at WildlifeDirect so that you can stay up to date on their noble work of saving elephants. In the meantime, please read the press release below and help in whichever way you can.

NAIROBI, Kenya – 20 May 2009. The future of a rare herd of desert elephants in Mali is under threat from one of the worst droughts in living memory, which has left a key water source at its lowest level in a quarter of a century and is breaking down the usual peaceful co-existence between the elephants and local herdsmen.

The 350 to 450 elephants of Gourma, the northernmost herds still alive in Africa, are being forced to trek ever-longer distances within the Sahel on the fringes of the Sahara to find scarce water, conservation organisation Save The Elephants warns today. Juveniles are likely to be among the worst affected, as – unlike the bigger bulls – their trunks are not long enough to reach deep into remaining wells.

Six elephants have already been found dead. Four others, including three calves, were recently extracted from a shallow well into which they had fallen when searching for water. Only the largest survived.

Save the Elephants’ scientist Jake Wall is in Mali following the situation closely. He says “Banzena has almost completely dried leaving no more than 30 cm of muddy, sediment filled water. The elephants are now in a deadly situation as they wait for the rains to begin. Six elephants have died in the last couple of months from causes related to the drought conditions.”

A group of NGO’s comprising Save the Elephants (STE) and The WILD Foundation (WILD) have been monitoring the last rare desert elephants in Mali in collaboration with the Malian Environment Ministry directorate for conservation – Direction Nationale de la Conservation de la Nature (DNCN). This unique herd of elephants is now in a desperate situation due to a drastic shortage of water, and we are launching an emergency appeal to save them.

The desert elephants of Mali live in the Gourma district to the South East of Timbuktu. They are the northernmost elephants surviving in Africa, estimated at between 350 and 450 in number. They have adapted to survive in the harsh conditions of the Sahel by migrating long distances in search of water and food but live on the margin of what is ecologically viable.

Dr Iain Douglas-Hamilton of Save the Elephants has been monitoring their range since the mid 1970s. He says “In the Gourma region of Mali are the last elephants living in the Sahel and they are northernmost in Africa. Their range has shrunk drastically since the 1970’s due to climate change and overstocking of livestock which has degraded the habitat. These elephants have the longest migration route of any in Africa and move in a counterclockwise circle of about 700km. At the height of the dry season there are only a handful of shallow lakes left to them until recharged by rains in July and August.

” This year the water levels are extremely low in the Gourma region due to uneven rainfall in 2008. The most important of these lakes, Banzena, is the lowest it has been since 1983 when it dried completely. Over the last few years a team of Save the Elephants and the WILD Foundation in collaboration with the DNCN have been closely following the movements of the elephants using 9 collars fitted with Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers. The collars transmit the hourly positions of the elephants three times daily via satellite link and give real-time information about the activities of the elephant herds.

On the16th May, Jake Wall a scientist with Save the Elephants returned from the most important water source, Lake Banzena, on which the elephants rely at the height of the dry season. He found it almost dry. “The situation is equally dire for the Touareg and Pheul herdsmen who rely on Banzena for their cattle and many cows are now dying each day from lack of water and the soaring temperatures which reach 50 degrees Celsius in the shade. The stench of rotting corpses fills the air and what little water remains is putrid and undrinkable by all standards.

The normal peaceful coexistence between the elephants and herdsmen is starting to break-down and giving way to conflict over access to water.” Very few options now exist for finding water and we are witnessing erratic movements further and further afield as they desperately search for water and forage.”Small thundershowers last week left tantalizing puddles 20 km to the south of Banzena, enough to survive on for a couple days at most, but the herds are now being forced back north to the almost dry lake.”

At a dry lake bed 50 km to the east of Banzena, 6 bull elephants are surviving by getting on their knees and reaching for water with their trunks that is 3 meters beneath ground level and through a hole dug by the Touareg. Younger elephants who are not as big or as skilled cannot possibly reach these to hard to get at water points. The long distances, high temperatures and weakened condition will also take a heavy toll on the younger elephants.

Jake Wall says “I have witnessed first hand how tough the situation can be for young elephants. Last year during a radio-collaring operation, I came across 3 elephant calves trapped in a mud hole along with a half grown female. From the age structure it looked like they had lost their matriarch. Evidently, this young female had led the youngsters into a waterless area. They happened upon a shallow well dug by herdsmen for watering cattle and it appears that the elephants, desperate for water, tumbled into the well and all four were hopelessly stuck in the mud for three days. Our Save the Elephants team pulled them out one by one, but they were so weak that only the large female survived. She was radio-tagged and we watched her dash 80 km to the nearest water at Lake Banzena.”

Urgent action is now needed to secure water for the elephants until the rains commence as predicted in early June. Fortunately, two pumps already exist at Banzena for pumping water and can be used for helping the elephants. Save the Elephants, in partnership with the WILD Foundation and the Mali government, is appealing for funds for diesel necessary for their operation. It is not certain whether the water quantity will be sufficient and close monitoring of the situation is needed.

If you want to help us save these elephants please send a donation via our website:

Tags: Africa, drought, dying, elephants, Mali, Timbuktu, water, West Africa

8 responses so far

Category: Africa, elephants, wildlifedirect | Date: May 04 2009 | By: admin

Dear Friends,

We have just heard sad news of the demise of Echo from Cynthia Moss of the Amboseli Trust for Elephants. Echo died on the 2nd of May from old age and the drought. I personally met Echo and others in the her family many times in Amboseli - she was easy to identify by her crossed tusks. She was a fierce protector of her family, builting it up from 7 individuals to 40 over the years. She and her family starred of the documentary Echo of the Elephants. If you haven’t seen it then you simply must. It is unforgettable.

Light a candle for Echo.

I can’t believe she is gone. Amboseli will never be the same.

RIP Echo.

Paula
Read more about this on AERP blog and Cynthia Moss blog at http://elephanttrust.org

Article at the following link:

http://elephanttrust.org/node/551

Tags: Amboseli, Amboseli Trust for Elephants, conservation, Cynthia Moss, E family, Echo, elephants, Ivory, Kenya

7 responses so far

Category: elephants | Date: Mar 10 2009 | By: baraza

 In a recent posting on bonobo in Congo blog, Therese Hart reported that her husband John had analysed recent elephant survey data in the DR Congo and had concluded that the total elephant population is likely under 20,000, and still dropping.  This is down from a population estimated at over 100,000 elephants 50 years ago!

Here’s where the elephants are

Shocking facts

Only 6 core populations (≥ 500 elephants occupying contiguous range) remain in DR Congo.

All of these core populations, except TL2 , are in a protected area.

All of these core populations are under poaching pressure.

All of these core populations have decreased in the last 10 years, some catastrophically.

We know of nine remnant populations (< 500 elephants, often less than 50 remain).  Others are possible.

Four remnant populations are within protected areas (Virunga, Upemba, Kahuzi Biega, Lomako).

These data should be ringing alarm bells around the world. Who is driving the killing of these elephants for ivory? Most of us in Africa have no doubt that it’s the Chinese even if the Chinese government deny this link. I have a few questions and wold love to hear your thoughts

How can we get CITES out of their offices to investigate these allegations

Is another ban on ivory trade the solution

How can we depress demand in ivory in China?

For further information and tables of data read the bonoboincongo blog post here, 

Tags: bonobo in congo, DR Congo, elephant population, elephants, population crash

6 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Jan 26 2009 | By: baraza

Elephants have had a love hate relationship with humans for centuries -Hannibal used them to cross the alps in 218 BC. It must have struck quite an image for Europeans. Well, here are some recent elephant stories that caught my attention and have left me wondering if humans and elephants can co-exist.

Hungry military consume 6 elephants in Zimbabwe

The state Parks and Wildlife Management Authority started supplying elephant meat to army barracks across the country last week a senior officer in the army has said.

It’s not surprising that people are starving in Zimbabwe due to bad policies, the government sees supplying elephant meat to soldiers as a two for one. It reduces excess animals while also feeding a starving army. Just last week six elephant carcasses were delivered to the army barracks where it was welcomed with relief by hungry soldiers.

Starving elephants demolish homes in Malawi

In Malawi it seems that it’s not only people who are going hungry, elephants in search of food are apparently moving out of the Phirilongwe Forest Reserve and raiding peoples homes – and destroying them in the process. Thousands of villagers in the area of Mponda in Mangochi district are living in absolute panic after elephants destroyed 4 homes and crops in search of food.   The elephants are desperate, they have nothing to eat in their territory.  Thankfully, nobody has been injured or killed. The local villagers want the elephants tarnslocated…you can read the full story here http://www.nyasatimes.com/national/2509.html

Labourer trampled by 4 elephants

In the second incident, a 55-year-old tea garden labourer, Haren Tanti, was trampled to death by four elephants. The elephants had strayed out of the national park but villagers later managed to scare away the wild animals. All of us at WildlifeDirect send our condolences to the family and friends of Sumitra and Haren.

Problem elephants are caught and then trained in India

In Africa, cases of human elephant conflict are often dealt with by destroying the elephants or translocation to another place. However in India where elephants are sacred they are ‘rescued’ and taken into captivity. A wild elephant that had recently killed in Avaregunda, has been caught in the Maldare forest range. Trained elephants named  Abimanyu, Arjuna, Harsha and Shri Rama of the forest department participated in the `operation capture’ in which the wild elephant attacked the trained ones.

We congratulate the brave elephant Abhimanyu and Ms Chinnappa and Dr Nagaraj who led the successful mission. You can read the full story here

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Mysore/6th_elephant_captured_in_Maldare_forest_range/articleshow/4030754.cms

Elephants in Russia may go on sale on the internet

Yury Durov, a renowned Russian circus trainer is desperately trying to keep two Indian elephants, Remi and Suzie, to whom he has devoted 30 years of his life in training and performing with at the Russian circus. If fails to come up with the asking price 100,000, Remi and Suzie will be auctioned off on the internet. You can read the story here

Russians celebrate Elephant heritage

Ironically, Russia claims a long history and culture of elephants and an exhibition of paintings, all featuring elephants, has just opened in Moscow. The title of the exhibition is ‘Russia is the Homeland of Elephants’

Tags: African elephants, circus elephants, elephants, human elephant conflict, Kaziranga

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Category: Uncategorized | Date: Jan 18 2009 | By: baraza

Another shocking story from Melissa Groo at Save the Elephants deserves some discussion about the justification of this action. Please feel free to leave a comment, opinion or insult for the British Killers.

British kill entire elephant herd (Zimbabwe) 

Hunting parties are paying out thousands to kill elephants, including calves, in Zimbabwe

Daniel Foggo, The Sunday Times

January 18, 2009

BRITISH hunters, including a prominent Harley Street surgeon, have been paying the Zimbabwean authorities thousands of pounds each to take part in a mass elephant cull.

They are among groups of hunters who have been permitted to track and kill whole herds, including their calves, before taking photographs of themselves with the carcasses.

Rumours that Zimbabwe was culling its population of 80,000-100,000 elephants have been circulating for some time, but definitive proof that foreigners have been paying to be involved has emerged only now.

Elephant culls are highly controversial. They typically involve killing every animal in a herd, usually about a dozen strong, and they are condemned as brutal and unnecessary by many conservationists.

Supporters argue that the animals are destroying ecosystems by stripping whole areas of edible foliage and monopolising water sources, and that killing is the only effective method of population control.

Alternatives, such as habitat expansion, relocation and even the use of contraception, are proposed by wildlife campaign groups, but the hunters reject them as unworkable.

Peter Carr, a professional hunting outfitter from Yorkshire, took a party to the Hwange national park last year to cull a herd of 11 elephants, including some “adolescent” calves.

The game reserve, which is Zimbabwe’s largest at more than 5,600 square miles, is said to be home to about 50,000 elephants, more than double its capacity.

One of Carr’s party was Benjamin Chang, a British orthopaedic surgeon who is based in London’s Harley Street. He paid £5,600 to take part, most of which was passed on to the Zimbabwean park authorities.

Chang and Carr shot three elephants each. Unlike conventional trophy-hunters, clients taking part in culls are not permitted to keep any part of the elephant; but they are allowed to take photographs.

Ivory from slaughtered elephants has been legally sold by the Zimbabwean authorities to China and Japan. Last November, Zimbabwe sold nearly four tons of ivory in a one-off sale permitted under international law, for £330,000.

The British hunters, who used specialist rifles to kill the elephants, said shooting was the most humane method of killing, although sometimes more than one shot was necessary to dispatch an animal.

Elephant welfare campaigners were horrified. Will Travers of the Born Free Foundation said: “These days it takes something pretty extraordinary to shock and distress as far as Zimbabwe is concerned. But news of the slaughter of elephants inside national parks still has the power to make you sick to your stomach.”

Michael Wamithi, the elephant programme manager for the International Fund for Animal Welfare said British hunters paying to kill elephants were unlikely to help Zimbabwean conservation efforts. “Because of the corruption and financial situation I would be surprised if anything at all reached conservation or communities,” he said.

However, Carr said he believed that the money would be used to help maintain the stability of the wildlife in the park.

Carr, author of a forthcoming book, Death in the Bush Veldt, which includes chapters on hunting elephants and other big game, said: “The elephants are slowly turning the land there into a desert. I consider myself a champion for elephants but they must be culled, although it’s such an awful word it makes the bunnyhuggers spit their dummies out.

“No one feels great after culling a herd: it is quite a sombre mood. You have to kill all of them - if any escape they can spread panic in other herds.”

Carr said the cull has been kept low-key. “I was asked last year if I could find clients to go over and shoot 100 elephants as part of the cull,” he said.

“I took one party over [including Chang] and had another 18 clients lined up, half of whom were British, but after that the reports of violence and unrest caused them to back out.”

The overall African elephant population has dropped from 1.3m in 1979 to about 500,000 today, but in some areas they are considered too numerous. South Africa is proposing a cull of elephants in Kruger national park for the first time since 1995.

In Zimbabwe starving people have resorted to killing elephants for food, and recent reports have suggested Mu-gabe’s soldiers are being given meat from carcasses.

Chang, 49, said it was right to use the elephants to feed the Zimbabwean people. “The meat goes to the village. They are queuing at the camp saying, ‘Please give us the meat.’ I was told one elephant will feed one village for 3½ months,” he said.

The hunter, who struck a thumbs-up pose for a picture of him astride an elephant he had shot, went on to shoot a lioness in South Africa. He defended the practice of foreigners paying to kill elephants. “The army could have done the cull themselves but they don’t have the right guns. You can’t use an automatic rifle, that would just be cruel,” he said.

Rich game

Big game hunting is a rich man’s pastime. Hunters must pay a fee to kill each animal, and are usually allowed to keep the skins as a “trophy”.

The so-called big five are the most popular prey. A bull elephant costs upwards of £6,500 and can be as expensive as £37,000. Lions cost between £8,000 and £15,000, buffalos from £6,000 and leopards between £8,000 and £15,000. White rhinos, which are often tranquillised with a dart rather than killed, start at about £5,000.

Article at the following link:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article5537002.ece

Tags: elephant culling, elephants, Save the elephants, Zimbabwe

8 responses so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Jan 13 2009 | By: baraza

I’ ve been troubled by recent events that affect elephants. The auction of ivory last year from four Africa countries to raise funds for elephant conservation. The people who made this decision don’t seem to care about the consequences, soon after the sales we heard that Kenya and other countries had made the largest ivory seizure the Chinese (who bought the legal ivory) were involved.

More recently we have heard of elephant poaching in Cameroon and DR Congo, and just as troubling, the latest story from Zimbabwe that to pacify the army, thousands of elephants have been slaughtered for meat.

Joyce Poole of ElephantVoices, and many others are fighting for the rights of elephants. And I think it’s brilliant. Just last year politicians voted to give apes rights in Spain. The significance of this decision is discussed here in Seed Magazine.

Well this could pave the way for all sentient species, elephants, apes, whales and others.

Why are elephants so special? Well, I’ll let this story persuade you.
Fact or Fiction?: Elephants Never Forget

Do elephants really have steel-trap memories?

By James Ritchie, Scientific American

Elephants do not have the greatest eyesight in the animal kingdom, but they never forget a face. Carol Buckley at The Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tenn., for instance, reports that in 1999 resident elephant Jenny became anxious and could hardly be contained when introduced to newcomer Shirley, an Asian elephant.

As the animals checked one another out with their trunks, Shirley, too, became animated and the two seemingly old friends had what appeared to be an emotional reunion. “There was this euphoria,”  sanctuary founder Buckley says. “Shirley started bellowing, and then Jenny did, too. Both trunks were checking out each other’s scars. I’ve never experienced anything that intense without it being aggression.”

Turns out the two elephants had briefly crossed paths years earlier. Buckley knew that Jenny had performed with the traveling Carson & Barnes Circus, before coming to the sanctuary in 1999, but she knew little about Shirley’s background. She did a little digging, only to discover that Shirley had been in the circus with Jenny for a few months—23 years earlier.

Remarkable recall power, researchers believe, is a big part of how elephants survive. Matriarch elephants, in particular, hold a store of social knowledge that their families can scarcely do without, according to research conducted on elephants at Amboseli National Park in Kenya.

Researchers from the University of Sussex in England discovered that elephant groups with a 55-year-old matriarch (elephants live around 50 to 60 years) were more likely to huddle in a defensive posture than those with a matriarch aged 35 when confronted by an unfamiliar elephant. The reason: they were aware such strangers were likely to start conflicts with the group and possibly harm calves, Karen McComb, a psychologist and animal behaviorist at Sussex, and her colleagues reported in Science.

Other researchers, who studied three herds of elephants during a severe 1993 drought at Tanzania’s Tarangire National Park, found that they not only recognize one another but also recall routes to alternate food and water sources when their usual areas dry up.

The scientists from the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) in New York City reported in Biology Letters that pachyderm groups with matriarchs, ages 38 and 45, left the parched park, apparently in search of water and grub, but the ones with a younger matriarch, age 33, stayed put.

Sixteen of 81 calves born in the park that year died in a nine-month period, a 20 percent mortality rate, much higher than the typical 2 percent; 10 of the dead were from the group that remained in the park, where feed and water were scarce.

Researchers concluded that the older elephants recalled a drought in the park that lasted from 1958 to 1961, and how their packs survived the slim pickings by migrating to lusher areas a distance away. None of the elephants that stayed behind were old enough to remember the previous dry spell.

Elephants also apparently recognize and can keep track of the locations of as many as 30 companions at a time, psychologist Richard Byrne of the University of Saint Andrews in Scotland and other researchers discovered during a 2007 study at Amboseli.

“Imagine taking your family to a crowded department store and the Christmas sales are on,” Byrne says. “What a job to keep track of where four or five family members are. These elephants are doing it with 30 traveling-mates.”

The scientists tested this memory by placing urine samples in front of female elephants, who thoroughly checked them with their trunks and acted up when they came across one that did not come from a member of their brood, and thereby should not have been there. “Most animals that hang around in packs, such as deer, probably have no idea who the other animals in their pack are,” Byrne says. But elephants “almost certainly know every [member] in their group.”

Such “working memory” is “far in advance of anything other animals have been shown to have,” Byrne adds, and helps the elephant monitor the family units that move, forage and socialize together.

When it comes to smarts, elephants are right up there with dolphins, apes and humans, says WCS cognitive scientist Diana Reiss and colleagues at Emory University in Atlanta. They reported in 2006 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA that elephants, like the other mammals in that exclusive circle, are the only animals known to recognize their reflections in a mirror.

Zoologist Iain Douglas-Hamilton, founder of Save the Elephants in Nairobi, Kenya, is an authority on pachyderms who has studied them since the 1960s. He recounts becoming so well acquainted with an elephant in Tanzania’s Lake Manyara National Park early in his career that he could actually walk beside her in the wild. He left the area in 1969 to write his thesis and did not return again for four years. But when he came back, he says, it was as though he’d never left. “She came right back up to me and behaved the same way,” he says, noting that they resumed their friendly strolls.

“They’re long-lived animals, and memory would be a benefit to a long-lived animal, making it more adaptive to circumstances,” Douglas-Hamilton says. “Clearly if elephants experience extremes of climate and they can remember where the food is during a year, they can survive.”

So the next time someone says you have a memory like an elephant, take it as a compliment.

Paula

(Thanks to Melissa Groo of Save the Elephants for sending the story from this link http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-01/10/content_10636175.htm)

P.S. Have you voted in the poll on the right?

Tags: ape rights, elephant memories, elephants, Ivory, Save the elephants

One response so far

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Dec 10 2008 | By: baraza

Dear Friends,

Don’t forget that you can donate a WildlifeDirect gift certificate to give to your  friends, family members or loved ones here. Once you have made a donation on the right hand donations bar, please email victor on victor@wildlifedirect.org and he will send you the gift certificate.

Thank you for your unrelenting support. From all of us at WildlifeDirect.

Help us by sharing this on facebook, myspace, bebo and wherever else you socialise online!

Tags: elephants, Gorillas, Masai Mara, National Geographic, Video, wildlifedirect

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Category: Ivory, Uncategorized | Date: Nov 03 2008 | By: baraza

Zimbabwe has just sold almost 4 tons of ivory for over $450,000 which they claim will go to the wildlife authority which is practically broke.

The auction of ivory that was sanctioned by CITES started in Botswana  on October 28. The United Nations’ Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites) allowed the countries to sell elephant ivory in a one-off trade.

As we’ve mentioned before, to everyones surprise China was approved in July this year as a buyer of legally stockpiled ivory in Zimbabwe, Botswana. Namibia and South Africa. China was approved even though many believe that they do not have adequate means to address illegal domestic ivory trade and to regulate legal trade effectively.

I was especially surprised to read this quote from Crawford Allan, director of TRAFFIC North America - the wildlife trade monitoring network earlier this year in July.

“Now that China has been approved, it has an opportunity to assist African countries, particularly in Central Africa, where elephant poaching and domestic trade goes unchecked, to improve law enforcement capacity, and support conservation programmes,”

It seems terribly premature to state this …even with the ivory sales money, Zimbabwe cannot put elephants protection measures into place at the moment.

Now that Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe have their dosh, it’s South Africa’s turn. They hope to raise R100-million this week, by selling 51 tons of elephant tusks, many of them from culled elephants. Namibia which has the lowest quality ivory (due to low humidity there) realized $150 per kg. If South Africa raises at least this amount per kg they will generate US $750,000 but it’s likely to be more.

Sounds like a lot of money for conservation until you recall that South Africa is not a poor country, with all those diamonds, coal and uranium etc this is small change. One cant help feeling that the glee on some faces is more to do to with winning an argument (that ivory should be sustainably used), rather than relief that a real problem has been solved. Nobody seems to be worried that these sales will put the burden of financing elephant protection in all other African elephant range states. Even if this money was given to other African states it would not make a difference, elephant ranges are notoriously difficult to protect especially when there is a thriving legal trade in a country like China that can bleach any ill gotten ivory.

It’s too late to cry now, but hopefully what these auctions will do is reignite the debate about the value of the ivory trade in this world to elephant conservation.  Is it just me or is there something insane about the lack of logic here. The fact is that the production of ivory trinkets threatens to decimate elephant populations in many parts of Africa and Asia. After spending more than 20 years working on this issue, I know I’ve got a very specific views. But I’m curious about what you think? Should we be legalizing ivory sales to generate funds to protect elephants?
Some people think that there is hope in the 9 year moratorium that will fall into place after the close of auctions. I recommend we all read  the small print, this moratorium is for these four countries only. I predict that Tanzania, Sudan, Congo, Zambia, Mozambie and possibly Angola will seek to sell their ivory stockpiles at the next CITES conference.

Moreover, I suspect that South Africa is likely to continue stockpiling ivory for future sales through it’s elephant culling program which was recently adopted through the new policy “norms and standards for elephant management” dealing with problem elephants in conservation areas.

Unlike elephants we humans seem to have short memories and have forgotten that we put a ban on ivory after we lost more than 80% of Africa’s elephants due to the ivory trade. The culprits were mainly in Japan and China – the same players are still in the game today.

Tags: Botswana, elephants, illegal killing of elephants, ivory trade, Namibia South Africa, Zimbabwe

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