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泰王国驻华盛顿大使馆副大使Nantana Sivakua在史密森尼国家动物园给一头名叫安比卡的64岁的亚洲象喂香蕉。

 

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U.S. Ambassador to Thailand Kristie Kenney, right, greets Ambika, an Asian elephant at the National Zoo in Washington. The zoo's elephant manager, Marie Galloway, is at left.

Washington — In honor of National Thai Elephant Day, the Smithsonian Institution’s National Zoological Park showcased its efforts to conserve Asian elephants and its partnership with Thai colleagues to protect Thailand’s wildlife and natural habitats.

National Zoo Director Dennis Kelly welcomed U.S. Ambassador to Thailand Kristie Kenney and Deputy Chief of Mission Nantana Sivakua of the Royal Thai Embassy in Washington to the zoo’s elephant housing complex March 12. Kelly and other zoo officials described the zoo’s work with Asian elephants and other endangered Asian species — including tigers and clouded leopards — over most of its 120-year history.

The zoo conducts research and breeding programs in Front Royal, Virginia, and at its headquarters in Washington. “We have become experts in animal care, cognition and disease,” Kelly said. “For example, we discovered an elephant herpes virus that’s responsible for killing as many as one-third of all baby elephants, and we’re trying to discover a cure.”

He pointed out that the National Zoo shares its expertise with scientists and institutions worldwide on elephant endocrinology, reproductive physiology (including artificial insemination), and the study and prevention of human/elephant conflict in the animals’ natural environment. The National Zoo, he said, is committed to conserving not only Asian but also African elephant populations, both in North American zoos and in the wild.

Two of the zoo’s scientists — Steve Monfort, director of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, and Donald Moore, associate director for animal care sciences — will travel to Thailand soon to meet with colleagues at Thai zoos.

“Our partnership with Thailand goes back over 25 years,” said Monfort. He cited the two countries’ work to conserve clouded leopards, a species that has proved difficult to breed in captivity. With clouded leopards, as with elephants, “we need to create an ‘insurance’ population” to supplement declining populations in the wild, Monfort said. A clouded leopard cub was recently born at the zoo’s Front Royal facility.

Kenney commented on the strong U.S.-Thai commitment to conserving Asian elephants and other species. “One of the things I’ve been proudest of is our relationships with Thai scientists, academics and park officials” who help manage elephant populations, she said. “These are very complex issues.”

Sivakua noted that “the elephant has a special status” in Thailand. “In the old days, elephants carried kings,” and in the mid-1800s, “Thailand’s king offered a pair of elephants” to U.S. President James Buchanan, she said. “The elephant is not only a national symbol of Thailand, but a symbol of friendship.”

NEW ELEPHANT QUARTERS

Ten years ago, the National Zoo began constructing a new elephant facility, investing more than $50 million in the project, according to Kelly. “We’ve learned a lot about elephant herds,” he said, and that knowledge has been factored into the facility’s design.

Asian elephant families — much like those of African elephants — are matriarchal, and “Asian herds are run by a grandmother,” Kelly said. To support the animals’ natural social behavior, the zoo’s elephant housing complex (comprising the new Elephant Barn as well as the original building, which is being renovated) has spacious stalls designed to accommodate eight animals, along with two solo enclosures for adult male elephants.

In the wild, adult males usually live separately or in loose “bachelor” herds, except during mating season, but the zoo’s facility will offer them a chance to interact with the matriarchal herd when they please, said elephant curator Tony Barthel.

The zoo has three Asian elephants and hopes to expand that number eventually. Ambika, a 64-year-old female given to the United States by India, has been living at the zoo since 1961, and 36-year-old Shanthi, also female, was a bicentennial gift to the United States from Sri Lanka. Shanthi’s adolescent son, 10-year-old Kandula, was born at the zoo, sired via artificial insemination by an Asian elephant living in a zoo in Canada.

The new Elephant Barn — where the elephants have been living for a year and a half — includes a kitchen, where zoo staffers prepare the animals’ meals and store their vitamin supplements. “Hay is the core of their diet,” said Barthel, “but they’re given fruit as a special treat.”

After touring the barn, Kenney and Sivakua greeted the elephants in an outdoors area and presented them with bananas, oranges and watermelons. The elephants consumed the bananas and oranges whole, peel and all, and Shanthi smashed the watermelon with her foot and scooped up its contents with her trunk.

FUTURE PLANS

Once the zoo expands its elephant herd, the goal is to have “true families” of related animals, said Marie Galloway, the zoo’s elephant manager. “One hundred years from now, we hope to have a self-sustaining herd, with females learning calf-rearing skills from each other.”

When renovations are complete, there will be elephant sculptures in front of the complex for kids to enjoy, said Kelly. “It will be a state-of-the-art scientific facility,” he said. “We’d like it to function as an extension of Thailand” and its elephant habitats. The next phase of construction will be complete in about a year and it will open to the public then. Kelly estimated that the final phase will be complete “in a few more years.”

“I think it’s wonderful that the United States is collaborating with Thailand to conserve species that live so far outside our borders,” said Kenney. “This event highlights the nearly 200-year history of Thailand and the United States, which is a historic friendship but also a modern partnership that takes advantage of modern tools and research techniques.”

More information about the Smithsonian Institution’s National Zoological Park and its conservation efforts is available at the zoo’s website.