The elephant soap opera

Delicate hierarchies make blending herds a difficult process

By Jeanette Steele, UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
Sunday, February 21, 2010 at 12:01 a.m.

It’s a little like high school, but with tusks and trumpeting.

The San Diego Zoo is trying to merge three elephant groups in its $45 million Elephant Odyssey exhibit in Balboa Park, and that’s not as simple as throwing open the gate and inviting everyone in.

Elephants have personalities, and they can be mean.

Zookeepers trimmed the tusks on Tembo, a female African elephant, because they were afraid she would stab another pachyderm while jostling for status in the yard.

“The elephants squabble, and it’s pretty impressive when they chase each other and make noise,” said Rod Owlett, the animal-care supervisor.

“There’s a lot of theater involved out there.”

The zoo’s longtime elephant trio — Sumithi, Devi and Tembo — must learn to live with Cha Cha, Cookie, Mary and, for the first time, a male, Ranchipur. The latter four are former residents of the zoo’s Wild Animal Park near Escondido, where an African elephant herd originally from Swaziland is still on exhibit.

Integration is a delicate dance for zookeepers because elephants build highly evolved communal networks centered on the most confident female. Pachyderms are so family-oriented that the herd mourns when a member dies.

Zoo officials said it will be worth the trouble if all or most of the Elephant Odyssey residents can live together. A larger herd would be the most enriching atmosphere for this very social species.

Since the merger started this summer, keepers have witnessed some head-butting, trumpeting and well-placed shots with a trunk.

Sumithi drove Tembo across the yard and into the pool, effectively giving the 9,000-pound elephant a “time out.”

Zookeepers are figuring out this unusual choreography as they go along. A more common situation would be one pachyderm joining an established herd.

“There are no rules. We can’t go to the research and say there are 10 other institutions that have taken two groups of elephants and integrated them together,” Owlett said. “No one has done this before, and that also makes it cool.”

He and his colleagues plan to share their findings with other institutions, eventually publishing a paper about their efforts.

To complicate the already complex merger, the zoo adopted two former circus elephants from Texas in August after the U.S. Department of Agriculture took them away from an exhibitor. Now Tina and Jewel — two females who have lived together for years — must be worked into the pachyderm dance.

On a recent morning, keepers began the elephant shuffle by pairing up Sumithi, matriarch of the longtime trio at the zoo, with Cha Cha, the smallest and most docile of the former Wild Animal Park pachyderms.

These two have become buddies, with Sumithi acting as Cha Cha’s protector.

Then, Devi and Tembo were released into the large elephant yard. An immediate change came over Cha Cha.

Sumithi, Devi and Tembo flapped their ears and waved their tails as they focused on eating tree branches and hay. But the petite Cha Cha grew still. Trunk down and ears flat, she positioned herself between Sumithi and Tembo, a known bully.

Senior animal keeper Scott Morford interpreted. Cha Cha was trying to decide whether she should stand with Sumithi, even though that would place her at the bottom of a hill slope. Or should she maintain the high ground, where she could see the other elephants but be unprotected?

After several minutes of wavering, Cha Cha headed downhill and cozied up to Sumithi.

“She’s built Tembo up in her head way more than she needs to be,” said Morford, sounding like an exasperated father at a play date gone wrong.

In the end, keepers are depending on Sumithi to keep the peace for the entire group. But there has been a price tag for the matriarch, who recently lost 1,500 pounds through the zoo’s diet and exercise plan.

Because these elephant encounters always involve food — to soothe the elephants, keepers said — chow hound Sumithi is again sporting rolls around her middle.

The San Diego Zoo’s elephants aren’t the only animals with challenging personalities.

At the hippopotamus tank, zookeepers expected newcomer Otis the river hippo to be a hit with Funani, the zoo’s longtime hippo resident.

Otis came to San Diego early last year from the Los Angeles Zoo. There was hope for quick mating and a baby hippo.

But when the 5,000-pound suitors met face to face, it was a bloodbath. Funani gouged chunks from Otis’ hide. After three days of mayhem, keepers separated them.

Months later, zoo officials reunited the star-crossed lovers after calculating that Funani would be in heat. They also took the precaution of trimming her razor-sharp teeth.

Finally, love bubbled up. The hippos mated within an hour and have lived together since.

“It is its own little soap opera,” said zoo spokeswoman Yadira Galindo.

Jeanette Steele: (619) 293-1030; jen.steele@uniontrib.com

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