Elephants, keepers deal with life and death in the herd
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| Submitted photo Clara the elephant, left, embraces the trunk of Raja, the St. Louis Zoo's male elephant, when Raja was 5 years old. Raja is now 14. Clara was euthanized last week because of age-related health issues. |
Both the Asian elephants and the crew that takes care of them at the Saint Louis Zoo have a heavy task at hand, as they grieve the death of Clara, matriarch of the herd. Zoo staff euthanized Clara last week, saying she was no longer responding to medicine to treat her arthritis.
The staff also has the task of fending of accusations by animal rights groups that zoo life is what led to Clara's death.Martha Fischer, curator of mammals at the zoo, said Clara, 54, had age-related problems, including arthritis.
"The main problem, and I don't know that it's a problem, is that she was an old animal. That's just the facts of life. Through marvels of medicine, we have been able to extend life greatly over the last decades," Fischer said. "Clara was over a decade beyond the average life expectancy for Asian elephants in the wild and in human care.
"Age and time took its toll on her, as age and time takes its toll on all of us."
The average life expectancy for Asian elephants in human care and in the wild is 44.8 years, Fischer said. They can live to be more than 60 years old, but that is unusual, she said.
Elliot Katz, president of California-based In Defense of Animals, which campaigns against keeping elephants in zoos, claims Clara would have fared better at a sanctuary than at the zoo.
"As far as I know, elephants could live in the wild to 70 years," Katz said. "It's keeping elephants on concrete and compacted surfaces and not giving them room to move that has created foot problems and premature death."
Fischer said it is wrong to equate Clara's health issues with lack of care or space. She said the staff did everything to care for her and would have loved to extend her life even more.
"We've been forced to become really good at geriatric animal care. We are so good at extending their life that we will be challenged to come up with different ways to care for them as they come up with age-related issues," Fischer said. "With Clara, her need was she started to have some discomfort with arthritis.
"We treated with comfort medication. That worked well, but there came a time when we ran out of options to keep her comfortable."
Fischer said Clara lived a normal life and was able to associate with the other elephants until the end. After her death, the staff allowed the other elephants to spend time with her.
"The loss is very much for her elephant friends whom she has lived with her whole life. Donna and Pearl for their whole lives have lived with Clara; Raja as well," Fischer said. "It's important for them to know that she has passed away so they can also go through the morning and the grieving they go through as part of this process.
"It was very quiet in the barn last night (March 14). It was definitely different."
However, other tasks for the elephant herd are more joyful. They recently welcomed the second of two new elephants when
Rani gave birth Feb. 25 to Jade. The newborn weighed 236 pounds at birth and dropped a little weight.
"She is very petite, very small, absolutely healthy and perfect and kind of noisy," Fischer said.
Jade has yet to make her first public appearance. Fischer said it would be up the herd to determine when they are ready for that. She said Rani has a lot to learn as a first-time mother, but she expects the elephant soon will be comfortable in the role.
Rani's mother, Elle, gave birth to Maliha on Aug. 2.
"I think in a normal situation this would be more like real life than just an adult herd that lives together all time - multiple age females, a reproductive bull, births. You also will have losses within the herd. I think this is a really normal structure," Fischer said.
