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Significantly lower lifespans
peerj.com
- A massive survey of zoo elephants shows that they have significantly lower lifespans in captivity.
www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/zoo-elephants-die-much-earlier-than-wild-ones
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Dec 11, 2008 · The team's analysis revealed that African zoo elephants had life spans of about 17 years, whereas those in Amboseli lived 56 years. The median life span for Asian zoo elephants was nearly 19 years, but at MTE it was almost 42 years.
- Overview
- Wild and Long-Lived
- Survival Strategies
- Huge Improvements
Wild elephants in protected areas of Africa and Asia live more than twice as long as those in European zoos, a new study has found.
Wild elephants in protected areas of Africa and Asia live more than twice as long as those in European zoos, a new study has found.
Animal welfare advocates have long clashed with zoo officials over concerns about the physical and mental health of elephants in captivity.
British and Canadian scientists who conducted the six-year study say their finding puts an end to that debate once and for all.
"We're worried that the whole system basically doesn't work and improving it is essential," said lead author Georgia Mason, a zoologist at the University of Guelph in Canada.
Obesity and stress are likely factors for the giant land mammals' early demise in captivity, she said.
Mason and colleagues looked at data from more than 4,500 wild and captive African and Asian elephants.
The data include elephants in European zoos, which house about half of the world's captive elephants; protected populations in Amboseli National Park in Kenya; and the Myanma Timber Enterprise in Myanmar (Burma), a government-run logging operation where Asian elephants are put to work.
Only the survival rates of females were analyzed because of their importance to future populations.
The findings show that captive elephants live considerably shorter lives.
For African elephants, the median life span is 17 years for zoo-born females, compared to 56 years in the Amboseli National Park population.
For Asian elephants, the results are "much more worrying because they are the rarer of the two species," Mason said.
To keep zoo elephants alive longer, the authors recommend routine screening for obesity (something that's done in U.S. captive elephant populations), as well as monitoring stress via a chemical known as interleukin-6.
Checking this biological marker, which shows that the body's immune system is battling sickness, would allow zoo officials to intervene before the animal is seriously ill, Mason said.
Robert Wiese, collections director at the San Diego Zoo in California, was not part of this study. He said making a comparison between the lifespan of captive and wild elephants may seem deceptively simple.
"There are just so many confounding issues, especially in small sample sizes [of] zoo animals, that it's hard to really separate and make sure you're comparing apples to apples," he said.
In 2004 Wiese co-authored a paper in the journal Zoo Biology showing the opposite of Mason's findings: that zoo elephants live as long as those in the wild.
He said that within the last decade accredited facilities have made huge improvements in the care of captive elephants by providing better nutrition to combat obesity, as well as environmental enrichment activities that reduce stress.
Aug 7, 2018 · Full lifespan is known for 3826 elephants, whilst right-censored lifespan was used for 2975 elephants that were either alive in 2000 or disappeared earlier without an exact date of death.
- Mirkka Lahdenperä, Khyne U. Mar, Alexandre Courtiol, Virpi Lummaa
- 2018
Dec 11, 2008 · Animal welfare experts say zoos cut short an elephant's life span, but can their evidence be trusted?
Oct 25, 2021 · Comprise a zoo of a lot of the animal species of the Andean Condor, the Asian Elephant, the Chimpanzee, and the African Elephant because these animals have the highest average overall median...
Dec 12, 2008 · On average, African elephants in Amboseli live for about 56 years, while those born in zoos lasted a mere 17 years. Even wild elephants that were killed by humans managed a good 36 years of...
Jul 21, 2009 · This study found that elephants have shorter life expectancy within zoos and that death rates are higher among elephant calves in zoos. According to a study of more than 4,500 elephants, researchers have found evidence that zoos can shorten the adult lifespans of both African and Asian elephants.
