Move sought for Japan's oldest elephant may be too late

[Judi Lynn]

Move sought for Japan's oldest elephant may be too late
Associated Press
By YURI KAGEYAMA
15 hours ago

TOKYO (AP) — In the humble zoo, among the small cages of owls, guinea pigs and raccoons, Japan's oldest elephant stands in a concrete pen about the size of half of a basketball court. She drinks sugar water from a bucket and munches on bananas with her last remaining tooth while a debate is being waged about where she should live out her final years.

A gift from the Thai government in 1949, Hanako, or "flower child," has lived in a zoo since she was 2 and her current 69 years is about the lifespan of captive Asian elephants.

An online petition drive wants her to be moved to a Thai sanctuary, to live in a natural, grassy habitat where elephants romp in herds, not alone in her concrete pen, with a wading pool she hardly uses and a nearby side building to spend the night. "Give her a real life or send her to a sanctuary," the petition says. It's attracted tens of thousands of signatures already, with the aim of submitting them to the suburban Tokyo zoo and the Japanese government.

Inokashira Park Zoo acknowledges it's not fully equipped to keep an elephant. Hanako will be its last, deputy director and general curator Hidemasa Hori said. But Hori insisted his zoo knew best how to care for her. The aging elephant doesn't like changes, and he believes she shouldn't be moved. "It is too late for Hanako," Hori said.

A Canadian visitor whose blog posts inspired the petition drive says Japan's views on animal welfare at zoos lag behind a global move toward mimicking the animal's natural environment. Vancouver resident Ulara Nakagawa said she was stunned to see Hanako, thinking for a moment that the elephant was a statue, so gray and still it was in its concrete pen.

More:
https://news.yahoo.com/move-sought-japans-oldest-elephant-may-too-052331434.html

[pscot]

1. Moving older elephants is problematic

SEATTLE, Wash. – A Seattle-based advocacy group is asking the U.S. Department of Agriculture to investigate the recent death of an Asian elephant at the Oklahoma City Zoo.

The elephant, named Chai, was transferred from Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo to the Oklahoma facility eight months ago, along with another elephant, named Bambo. Zookeepers found Chai dead in the elephant yard Saturday morning.

Friends of the Woodland Park Zoo Elephants says it filed a complaint Tuesday with the USDA. The organization says it’s concerned that Chai died at age 37 _ which it says is far younger than the expected Asian elephant lifespan of 60 to 70 years in the wild and the median lifespan of 47 years for zoo elephants.

http://kfor.com/2016/02/02/seattle-based-group-asking-usda-to-investigate-elephants-death-at-oklahoma-city-zoo/