Elephant Mother Rejects Calf at St. Louis Zoo

Earlier this month, Rani, a 10-year old mother elephant living at St. Louis Zoo, rejected her newborn calf, prompting IDA to call on the zoo to end its elephant breeding program. The likely reasons Rani has rejected her calf include artificial zoo conditions (including cramped and barren quarters), limited social groupings, and birth protocols that call for isolating and chaining laboring mothers.

"This is not an issue of inexperience. It's an issue of the zoo environment producing dysfunctional elephants," said IDA President Elliot M. Katz, DVM, noting that Rani was raised with her mother, Ellie, in the zoo. "Under normal conditions, Rani would have learned mothering behavior from Ellie, and Ellie would have helped Rani and taught her how to care for her new calf. Something is obviously very wrong."

Elephants are highly intelligent and socially complex individuals renowned for developing strong bonds between family members. Raising calves is cited as the most important experience in a female elephant's life. In the wild, where calf rejection is unheard of, a mother and young calf are in almost constant physical contact, with the calf never more than a few feet away. A female elephant will remain with her mother for life, and males stay with the family until their early teens.

Calf-rejection is a captivity-related problem, one of many created by holding elephants in unnatural and inadequate conditions. Dr. Katz stated, "No matter how much care Rani's calf is given by the St. Louis Zoo staff, it can never replace her essential need to bond with her mother."

Breeding elephants in zoos plays no part in conservation, since offspring born in captivity will never be released in the wild. Zoos have had poor success in breeding elephants, with high rates of infertility, infant mortality, and stillbirths. Nationwide, in the last 6 years, at least 14 zoo elephant pregnancies have ended in stillbirth or other complications, including calves dying during labor, euthanasia of premature calves, and subsequent failure to thrive.

At St. Louis Zoo, Sri, an Asian elephant, lost her full-term calf in utero in November 2005; she has yet to expel the fetus. In August 2006, Ellie's baby Maliha had to be force fed shortly after birth. "This is just one more indication that zoos are simply not meeting the complex needs of elephants," states Katz. "Zoos should not hold elephants unless they can provide the space and natural conditions that elephants need to thrive."

In March, the zoo euthanized an Asian elephant named Clara, who was crippled with severe foot and joint disease. Both conditions are linked to intense confinement, lack of exercise, and standing on concrete and other unnatural surfaces at the zoo.

For more information about the plight of elephants in zoos and what you can do to help them, please visit www.helpelephants.com.