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Elephants have played an important
role in Thai history. In the old days, elephants
were known as beasts of war. The most famous elephant-back
fight was the duel in 1593 between King Naresuan
of Thailand and the Crown Prince of Burma, in
which the latter was slain. In the reign of Narai
the Great (1656-1688), the king was reputed to
have an army with 20,000 elephants under his command.
Moreover, the pachyderms were also an important
means of transport.
After the invention of firearms, the use of elephants
in war soon became obsolete. Nowadays, the pachyderms
are still trained for hauling logs in some mountainous
areas in the North. However, the most significant
role of elephants today, at least so far as foreign
tourists are concerned, is to give performances.
According to statistics of the Department of Livestock
Development, the number of domesticated elephants
in 1950 was 13,397. It has fallen dramatically
to 2,988 in 1983 and 2,681 in 2001. There are
no reliable estimates of the numbers of wild elephants.
But as more and more forests have been cleared,
their number must also have decreased sharply.
Other factors causing this decrease are as follows.
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A painting
depicting King Naresuan
in the elephant-back battle with the
Crown Prince of Burma. |
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- Food sources and habitats of elephants have
been destroyed rapidly, forcing wild elephants
to intrude into agricultural areas. Some even
get injured by the owners of the lands who
claim the rights over their properties.
- They suffer and die from tetanus because
germs enter their bodies through holes left
after their tusks are cut off. These tusks
are sold to some of the rich who want to boast
about their wealth by decorating their houses
with ivories without worrying about the loss
of elephants' lives.
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Elephants are hauling logs. |
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- Thai elephants' birth
rates are relatively low. This is because
there are not many male elephants being able
to breed. Furthermore, female elephants have
to work hard all year round. Therefore, they
are not mated at a suitable time. As for those
who are mated, some are still unable to produce
young.
- There is a medical report
of tumours in female elephants whose ages
are more than 35. What makes the veterinarians
worried is that this kind of tumour will reduce
the chance of the embryonic formation.
Because of this threatening situation, several
attempts have been made to help save the pachyderms'
lives and to increase their numbers. Two outstanding
projects are the Elephant Hospital and the
Elephants' Semen Freezing Project.
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| The
Elephant Hospital |
| The Elephant Hospital was
established in 1994 as the first of its kind in
the world, by Khun Soraida Salwala, the founder
of the Friends of the Asian Elephant Foundation.
Inspired by her imprinted childhood memory of
an ill-fated elephant, the lady has fulfilled
her dream to help them. The hospital is in Amphoe
Hang Chat in Lampang, a province in the North,
providing medical treatment for elephants free
of charge. |
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The Elephant
Hospital in Lampang
(By courtesy of Khun Soraida Salwala) |
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The
hospital consists of six units of pavilion-like
iron buildings equipped with modern
medical appliances.
These six units are:
- Three infirmary units, each of which
can accommodate one grown-up elephant.
- One infirmary unit accommodating a
baby elephant
- One resting unit accommodating up
to 3 grown-up elephants
- One special unit for Motala, an ill-fated
elephant grievously injured in a minefield |
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Khun
Soraida Salwala |
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This meritorious service is
carried out by a small group of people, including
a veterinarian and assistants. The hospital also
sends its veterinarians to treat elephants at
their homes.
"Up to today the hospital
has given medical care to almost 700 elephants.
Of this number no more than 10 elephants died
because they were sent in when seriously ill.
Khammi was an example. He had suffered from tetanus
for several years because his tusks had been cut
off. After five years of medical treatment, we
lost him a few months ago," Khun Soraida
told Thaiways sorrowfully in the recent telephone
interview. |
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An elephant
is being cleaned
up by the help of mahouts. |
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| According to Khun Soraida,
to save one elephant's life requires great efforts.
One grown-up elephant eats 200 kg of food per
day. Moreover, a sick one needs a large amount
of medicine--several
times more than a human. But no matter how hard
it would be to ease the elephants' pains, she
and her team will continue carrying on their mission
for a long time to come. |
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| The
Elephants' Semen Freezing Project |
| Another attempt
is the Elephants' Semen Freezing Project. It is
based on the fact that if there is no serious
study about elephants' reproductive system, it
is likely that Thai elephants would become extinct.Thanks
to the development of artificial insemination
in Thailand, many researches have been made to
help increase the elephants' birth rates. |
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Elephants'
activities --trekking |
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| According to
the information from the joint project between
the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Kasetsart
University and the Thai Elephant Conservation
Centre, the method of elephants' semen freezing
can be adapted to suit Thai elephants' physical
conditions. From the researches, Khun Nikorn Thongtip,
a veterinarian and the leader of the project finds
out that most Thai elephants' semen is not perfect.
This is the one major drawback of elephant natural
mating. Other drawbacks are: |
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Elephants'
activities --bathing |
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- The number of bull elephants with high-quality
semen is very small. As a result, the reproducing
process is limited within a narrow group.
Therefore, the tendency of incestuous mating
is increasing while the diversity of genes
becomes less.
- It is difficult to bring bull elephants
to mate with female ones due to their gigantic
sizes and weights. Moreover, the transfer
tends to spread infectious diseases.
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Elephants' activities--being trained
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- The price of breeding is up to the owners
of bull elephants. Sometimes it is so expensive
that the female elephants' owners cannot afford.
In addition, some owners of the elephants
with beautiful tusks ask for tusk insurance
at a high cost and do not want their elephants
to travel so far. These restrictions limit
the chance of a good breed's diversity.
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Elephants' activities--being trained
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- Elephants are social animals. They need
time to get on intimate terms with each other
before mating. But the owners might lose their
income if their elephants stop working. So
the pachyderms are not allowed time to breed.
To help prevent pachyderms from extinction,
Khun Nikorn and his team have devoted themselves
to research and have finally come up with
the first success in freezing Asian elephants'
semen in April 2002. With the Manual Collection
method, the researchers get high-quality semen.
In addition to Manual Collection, there are
two other methods to collect elephants' sperm
viz. :
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| Electroejaculation |
| Elephants will
be anaesthetized before being stimulated by low
electricity at their reproductive organs to make
them ejaculate. This method is very expensive.
Besides, it is too risky because elephants might
die of anaesthesia. |
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| Modified
artificial vagina |
| This process
is not practical because elephants have to be
trained for a period of time to make them ejaculate
with a fake vagina. Furthermore, the preparation
of the artificial vagina is too complicated. |
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| The
veterinarian team is at work
on the elephants' semen collection. |
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| Khun Nikorn's
team therefore chose the third method which is
the Manual Collection. Originated
in the USA, this method is conducted by massaging
elephants' sexual glands through the anal area. |
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The
veterinarian team is at work
on the elephants' semen collection. |
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| It is safe for
both elephants and men as it can be practised
with untamed elephants and needs no anaesthesia.
The study by Khun Nikorn's team has proved that
this method is so effective that the ejaculation
produced high-quality semen (with a pH balance
and a high percentage of sperm moving forward).
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| Elephants'
sperm magnified
(By courtesy of Khun Nikorn Thongtip)
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| With the cooperation
between the cited organizations and a strong devotion
to helping elephants, it is believed that in the
near future, the elephants' death rates will decrease,
the number of newborn elephants will increase
more and more, making elephants abundant in Thailand
as it used to be more than a century ago.
Special thanks to :
Khun Soraida Salwala from the Friends of the
Asian Elephant Foundation (Tel. 0 2945 7124-6)
Khun Nikorn Thongtip, a veterinarian of the
Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Kasetsart University
and the leader of the Elephants' Semen Freezing
Project
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