{"id":118835,"date":"2021-10-03T17:14:18","date_gmt":"2021-10-04T00:14:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=118835"},"modified":"2021-10-13T14:01:24","modified_gmt":"2021-10-13T21:01:24","slug":"the-elephant-in-sri-lanka-part-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/10\/03\/the-elephant-in-sri-lanka-part-6\/","title":{"rendered":"THE ELEPHANT IN SRI LANKA Part 6"},"content":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

Revised\n12.10.21<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jayewardene\ncarried out a survey of domesticated elephants in 1997. This survey revealed\nthat there were about 214 domesticated elephants in Sri Lanka at that time. Of\nthese, 107 were males and 107 were females. There were domesticated elephants\nin 15 of administrative districts in the country. The districts that had\nelephants were Colombo (34), Kandy (33), Galle (1), Kalutara (15), Kegalle\n(51), Kurunegala (12), Ratnapura (22), Matara (7), Hambantota (1), Matale (2),\nNuwara Eliya (2), Gampaha (22), Badulla (8), Polonnaruwa (1) and Moneragala\n(3). It is in these districts with the highest numbers – Kegalle, Colombo and\nKandy – that families have had elephants for a long time and that the more\naffluent families live. (Jayewardene, 1997). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 in 1998 he found that Even though\nowners face many problems they prefer to own at least one more elephant, and\nin  2001 \nhe found that   a number of\npersons who own or have owned an elephant have indicated that they would like\nto own at least one more elephant. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dangolla and\nSilva (2021) found that the number of domesticated elephants, in 15 of the\ndistricts in Sri Lanka, was between 180 and 190. The largest number of domestic\nelephants belongs to the Dalada Maligawa, followed by two private owners\nMillangoda (10), B.B. Jayasekera (7) and Gangaramaya temple in Colombo (4) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The long felt\nneed of the owners for an association was accomplished in November 1999 by\nforming, for the first time in Sri Lanka, The Captive Elephant Owners\u2019\nAssociation for the welfare of the captive elephant. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ilangakoon\n(1993) observed that some owners earn revenue from their elephants, while some\nallow the keeper to find work and earn the keep of the elephant. A few keep elephants for prestige or as pets\nbecause they like elephants or because their families have kept elephants for\ngenerations, and these elephants lead a relaxed life and are usually well cared\nfor said Illangakoon . <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jayewardene\nobserved that some owners keep the elephants with them and are aware, on a\ndaily basis, what each of their elephants is doing in the form of work. Some\nowners do not know where their elephants work. The fate of the elephant is\nentirely in the hands of the mahout. In some\ninstances the owner sees the elephants only at one of the temple processions or\nperahera. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Keeping an elephant started to became\ndifficult. . The Land Reform Act in 1972, affected many elephant owners. The\nlarge landholdings that some of the elephant owners had were greatly reduced\nand they had to go elsewhere in search of food for their elephants, as they\ncould no longer find it on their estates.. Many owners sold their elephants.\nThere was a ready market for these elephants from an increasing population of nouveaux riche that saw the ownership\nof an elephant as a status symbol.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Owners now find\nit increasingly difficult to maintain their elephants due to scarcity of food,\nunavailability of veterinary services in most areas, and shortage of work for\nan elephant due to mechanization of the timber industry, said specialists in\n2021. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Modern machinery\nhas gradually replaced the elephant at work. The machine was quicker and more\nefficient than a slow moving elephant. The work available for elephants is\ngetting less and, as a result, incomes derived from this work are shrinking. This means\nthat owners have to supplement the earnings from the elephants to maintain\nthem. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Food is\nbecoming increasingly difficult to find. Jak, Kitul, coconut which constitute a large part of a tame elephant’s food, is becoming scarce everywhere\nand owners find it difficult to obtain this food. Also it is more\nexpensive. Due to\nscarcity jak, kitul and coconut   prices\nhave gone up. It is also difficult\nto find the large quantity of food that the elephant requires daily. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is now\nvery difficult to obtain veterinary services for the treatment of elephant\nillnesses and diseases. In some areas such services are non-existent, observed\nJayawardene. Most owners\nfind it difficult to obtain the services of either a good veterinary surgeon, a\ntraditional medical practitioner (Veda\nMahaththaya) or native physician. However, <\/strong>a majority of owners and elephant keepers have enormous faith on\nnative ayurvedic medicaments for different ailments of their elephants, said\nDangolla and Silva. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The veterinary\nservices for the domesticated animals in the country are provided by the\nDepartment of Animal Production and Health. This Department has posted\nveterinary surgeons in all parts of the country. Though these veterinary\nsurgeons are capable of treating domestic pets and livestock, they have very\nlittle or no experience in the treatment of tame elephants. In some parts of\nthe country there are no veterinary surgeons. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It s not only\nthe lack of training and experience that prevents veterinary surgeons from\ntreating elephants, but also the fact that they are not comfortable in the\npresence of such a large animal. During the course of their education and\ntraining they do not work with elephants. It is only very rarely that they get\nan opportunity to treat an elephant in their student days. Later when they are\nposted to field stations, they are called upon, occasionally, to treat a\ndomesticated elephant. This is very difficult for them and it does not give\nthem the experience they need. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri Lanka\nveterinarians noted that western therapy for elephants evolved later. Our\nexperience is that the use of native medicines is beneficial in enhancing the\nprognosis of western therapy, said Dangolla and Silva. The herbal mixtures for\nremoval of pyogenic membranes in abscesses, and treatment for constipation are\ntwo examples. Jaywardene however, observed that according to modern science some\ntraditional practices are not good. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Improved\nveterinary services are also absolutely essential if the domesticated elephants\nare to be well tended and cared for. The government will have to employ and\ntrain veterinary surgeons and post them to districts where there are\ndomesticated elephants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Traditionally,\nin Sri Lanka native medicine has been used to treat elephants and it is only in\na few instances that veterinary surgeons have been called on to treat tame\nelephants. Most elephant owners prefer native treatments. Most of the older\nbreed of elephant owners continue with the Sinhala or traditional treatments but\nsome owners now prefer western treatments. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However,\nNative practitioners, do not seem to be passing on their knowledge to their\nchildren, as was done in the past. With only a few elephants around it does not\nseem useful for a native physician to learn how to treat elephants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The books\nthat native physicians have compiled on the various treatments for elephant\nillnesses and diseases, are not being reproduced. These books, called the Ali Veda Potha, are hand-written by\nthe individual physicians rather than printed., these books should be formally\npublished  in Sinhala and also in English\ntranslation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A number of\nmahouts are also adept at treating elephants. They have learned the skill from Veda Mahaththayas or from other older\nmahouts who have some knowledge of the treatment of elephant ailments and\ndiseases. Some mahouts have worked out their own treatments. Dangolla and Silva\nreported in 2021 that mahouts preferred\nnative herbal medicaments for their elephants.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dangolla and\nSilva   did  study of the mahouts. All keepers are\nSinhala  Buddhist males and half of them\nare over  40. Approximately 50% were\nregular alcohol consumers or heavy smokers. A majority (70%) earn more than an\naverage laborer, and have studied up to Grade 8 (79%). They provide\nsatisfactory level of education to their children, and none of them like their\nchildren to be elephant keepers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jayantha Jayawardene recorded that the standard of mahoutship was\nnot as good as it was in former times. The traditional\nskills are no longer handed down from father to son so the mahouts nowadays do\nnot have the detailed knowledge that mahouts had in former times. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today there\nis a problem about providing tame elephants for the future. In order to provide\nworking elephants, provision was made for capturing\nelephants on permit . However, permits to capture wild elephants have not been issued\nfor at least 20 years. This is the main reason why we do not see much young\nelephants in our domesticated population, said Dangolla and Silva in 2021 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now there are\nno elephants coming in from the wild except those that are brought as orphans\nto the Pinnawela Elephant Orphanage. With no replenishment from the wild the\nnumber of the domesticated elephants in this country is dwindling rapidly. There are no\ncaptive births either. Both these factors restrict the number of elephants\navailable <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strategies\nhave to be adopted to ensure that the domesticated elephant population in this\ncountry does not diminish and that there are sufficient elephants for our\ndomestic purposes. Captive breeding is an important strategy for a) for\nelephant conservation and in trying to keep the numbers of the domesticated\nelephants at a high level; and b) in the event of a threat of extinction of the\nspecies ,said Jayantha Jayawardene <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is  also necessary to have adequate supplies of\nfood easily available. Large scale planting of the domesticated elephant’s\npreferred foods is very essential. This cannot be done by individuals, it t has\nto be done by an organization. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My survey has\nrevealed that a number of owners and mahouts have recognized the need to\nimprove their knowledge of elephant care and management, said Jayawardene.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 They need advice and assistance to\nbreed their elephants and training on new methods of elephant management. They\nneed education on foot care and on balanced diet, since different foliage and\nsoil in some parts of Sri Lanka are deficient in minerals such as calcium and\nmagnesium.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mahouts today\nhave only a very basic idea of elephant care and managementtoday.<\/strong> <\/strong>Improved\ntraining for mahouts in modern methods of elephant care and management is\nessential. Though the traditional techniques have been developed for hundreds\nof years and passed down, it is now time for scientific methods of elephant\nmanagement to be adopted, said Jayantha Jayawardene.  <\/strong>(Continued)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS Revised 12.10.21 Jayewardene carried out a survey of domesticated elephants in 1997. This survey revealed that there were about 214 domesticated elephants in Sri Lanka at that time. Of these, 107 were males and 107 were females. There were domesticated elephants in 15 of administrative districts in the country. The districts that had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-118835","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kamalika-pieris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118835","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118835"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118835\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118835"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118835"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118835"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}