Zoo elephants die sooner than elephants in the wild, study says

A small paper in North America's most prestigious scientific journal is sending a stampede of controversy through the zoo world by suggesting captive elephants are doomed to live shorter lives than their wild counterparts.

Zoo elephants are living truncated lives, as little as one-third the lifespan of pachyderms in protected preserves, says the study, which was co-authored by a top University of Guelph veterinarian.

The paper, which looked at 4,500 elephants, appears today in the journal Science.

But news of the research has already been trumpeted throughout the international zoo community.

Zoo officials charge the paper is based on living conditions that no longer exist in prestigious facilities and does not take into account the North American experience with elephant care.

University of Guelph vet Dr. Georgia Mason, the senior study author, says her research looked at 45 years of breeding data from African game parks, Burmese logging operations and zoos across Europe to reach its "counterintuitive" conclusion.

That is, despite facing predators, parasites and the occasional drought, wild elephant life spans can be triple those of their pampered and doctored zoo counterparts, Mason says.

African elephants lived a median of about 17 years in captivity, while those in Kenya's Amboseli National Park averaged 56.

Indeed, Mason says, zoos appear to be so bad for the animals that even Indian elephants raised to be bulldozers in the Burmese logging industry have longer lives. Captive Indians lived about 19 years in zoos while the logging animals lived an average of 42 in the forests.

But Dr. Bill Rapley, head of conservation and research at the Toronto Zoo, was highly critical of the paper and said it did not reflect the elephant experience in modern North American facilities like his.

"This paper, I think, it's sort of like you can take a machine gun and shoot holes through it," says Rapley, the zoo's original veterinarian, who questioned the study's accuracy and findings.

Rapley says his African elephant sisters Tara and Tessa are already 40, while Iringa is 39, Toka, 38 and Thika, the youngest, 28.

He says that's far older than the zoo Africans found in the study. The zoo did, however, lose the female Tequila, Thika's mother, at 38, last September.

A local zoo did draw praise, however, from Mason for its elephant record. The African Lion Safari near Cambridge was particularly praised for its infant survival rates.

Safari elephant superintendent Charlie Gray says the size of their park, and the ability of the elephants to utilize much of its 300 hectares has helped his herd thrive.

As well, the herd of 15 has a dynamic social structure with ages that vary from a few months to 47.

Steve Feldman, a spokesperson for the powerful Association of Zoos and Aquariums, also criticized the paper. His biggest criticism was that it relies on European data and that the standard of care there may not be as high as in North American facilities.

Any association affiliate, such as the Toronto Zoo, must meet mandatory elephant care standards that include large enclosures with varied terrains and activities.

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