Claims That Trainers at Animal Park Brutally Beat Elephant Prompt Probe

Elephant trainers at the San Diego Wild Animal Park used “excessive force” while disciplining an elephant shortly after it was transferred to the park from the San Diego Zoo three months ago, according to an official of the San Diego Zoological Society who investigated the incident.

“I think they lost their tempers, but I think one can empathize,” said Dr. Werner Heuschele, a veterinarian and director of research for the Zoological Society, which operates both the zoo and the Wild Animal Park. “They chained the animal on all four legs then pulled it to rest and whacked on its head,” he said.

The elephant had become aggressive, Heuschele said, and had threatened the lives of the keepers by attempting to slam them against a wall in the elephant barn at the park.

The Humane Society of the United States is looking into “numerous complaints” that as many as six trainers at the park “went too far” in disciplining the elephant and that there may have been inadequate preparation for the elephant’s transfer, said David Herbet, captive wildlife specialist at the society’s Washington headquarters.

Investigator Due in S.D

The Humane Society is concerned that “normal elephant management procedures in the transfer were not followed and that, resulting from that, possible abuse of the elephant occurred,” Herbet said. The society will send an investigator to San Diego within the next week, he said.

Officials and trainers at the Wild Animal Park vehemently deny that excessive force was used on the elephant.

Alan Roocroft, the supervisor in charge of the elephants at the Wild Animal Park, said any damage done to the elephant was “superficial.”

He acknowledged that the animal was struck on its head with an elephant hook, a leather-covered baton with a steel hook at one end. He called the procedure a routine discipline for elephants that are out of control.

At the center of the controversy is an 18-year-old African elephant called Dunda, short for Madundamela, who was captured in the wild but has spent most of her life with a small herd of elephants at the San Diego Zoo. The elephant is now living among a breeding herd at the Wild Animal Park. Ragged sections of skin are visible where the injuries have not fully healed.

Dunda was abruptly transferred to the Wild Animal Park on Feb. 16, according to three elephant trainers at the zoo who were contacted by The Times. They said that neither zoo nor Wild Animal Park officials ever consulted them about the transfer, which they believe was poorly planned. The quick transfer did not allow for a transitional period during which Dunda could become familiar with her new keepers as well as the crate in which she was to be transferred, they said.

The incident has caused a bitter dispute between elephant keepers at the zoo, who say they never had any trouble with the animal, and keepers at the Wild Animal Park, who say the elephant was out of control. Keepers at the zoo say their complaints about the matter have been ignored and that they have been told by management that they are behaving “hysterically.”

Properly Handled?

“What has developed here is a bit of a turf war between facilities,” said Tom Hanscom, a spokesman for the Wild Animal Park, a 1,800-acre preserve east of Escondido. “An animal came up here from the zoo. It needed some training. It had to be trained up here for its own safety.”

Douglas Myers, executive director of the San Diego Zoological Society, said Tuesday that he is conducting “an extensive investigation,” the results of which may be available by the end of the week.

“My investigation is not complete,” Myers said. “I can respond that, yes, discipline is used and will continue to be used. . . . To date I feel that everything was handled properly.”

“The park is probably the world’s leader as far as elephant handling and elephant breeding,” Myers said. “Any mistreatment of any animal in the organization is a big concern.”

Myers said the elephant will become part of a breeding program at the Wild Animal Park and was transferred because the herd at the zoo was becoming too large. “We wanted to open more space for the elephants at the zoo,” Myers said. The breeding program will be run by Roocroft, “one of the leading elephant people in the world,” Myers said.

Asked whether adequate preparation had been made for Dunda’s transfer, Myers said, “I think we can probably second-guess ourselves till the elephants come home. It was very successful.”

Myers said he has received Heuschele’s report and is conducting further interviews.

A ‘Cold’ Move

In an interview with The Times last week, Steve Friedland, senior elephant trainer at the zoo, said Dunda’s transfer should have been carried out gradually, over about a month’s time, but instead was “done cold.” On Feb. 15, the night before the move, a crate was left at the gate to the elephant enclosure at the zoo and, about 6 a.m. the next day, Dunda was tranquilized, chained and led into the crate, Friedland said. The crate was then lifted by a crane onto a flatbed truck.

None of the trainers from the park had gone to the zoo before the day of the transfer to allow the elephant to become familiar with them, Friedland said. “They never looked at her except to estimate her length for the crate,” Friedland said.

He added that none of the zoo trainers, who were well-known to the animal, were permitted to go along on the trip to the Wild Animal Park. “We weren’t involved in the planning in any way,” Friedland said.

He described the animal as “extremely frightened” when it left the zoo.

Within a few days of the transfer, rumors that the elephant had been beaten began to circulate, said Lisa Landres, senior elephant keeper at the zoo.

About three weeks after the transfer, Landres went to the Wild Animal Park and photographed the elephant, she said. “I’ve been working with her for six years, and I’ve known her for 10 years,” she said. “She happened to be a favorite of mine.

“What I saw was an animal that had a tremendous amount of damage to her head. She appeared to be injured. Her face was swollen and puffy.”

Now, three months later, “the scarring is incredible,” Landres said. “She still continues to throw dirt on it and rub it.”

Elephants treat their wounds by coating them with dirt and mud picked up with their trunks, Friedland said.

‘Extremely Brutal’

Landres said she had the photographs developed and showed them to Friedland and Pat Hogg, another elephant keeper at the zoo.

“We all agree that discipline is necessary in some form at some time,” Friedland said. “But this case is extremely brutal. It is not normal. There is no debate about it. I’ve never seen anything close to this before.”

Copies of the photographs were given to zoo officials, who at first promised to investigate, Landres said, but later told them they were “anthropomorphizing”--assigning human emotions to lower animals.

“We tried to do everything we could by going through our supervisors,” Hogg said. “Basically we were told we were hysterical.”

Friedland said, “It seemed we were the ones who were being disciplined, chastised for having brought it to their attention.”

What actually happened in the elephant barn at the Wild Animal Park remains unclear.

Herbet of the Humane Society said that, according to complaints he considers “reliable,” keepers at the park, “after short-chaining the elephant and stretching it out, disciplined it and appeared to have gone too far.”

Roocroft, the elephant supervisor at the Wild Animal Park, said he was in charge of the transfer and that no unnecessary discipline was administered. “We love these animals,” Roocroft said.

Roocroft declined to say how many times the elephant was struck or name others who were involved in the transfer.

Dunda was hosed down and given alfalfa and apples when she arrived at the park, he said. However, the elephant remained agitated, he said.

“It’s like a mustang in a stall. Someone’s got to go in and put her halter on,” he said. He said she was disciplined for only one day before she was brought under control and is now quite well-behaved.

“It’s a day out of an elephant’s life,” he said. “The rest of her life is bliss, if you can call captivity bliss.”

‘Professional Manner’

Roocroft said the transfer was done in a “professional manner” and that he disagrees with those who advocate gradual moves, allowing the animal to get used to its new keeper and to eat meals in its crate for several weeks before the move. “You can banana them into a crate all you want, but when the door goes on behind them, they just come unglued,” he said. “When the door closes, it’s all gone.”

“I like the animals under a certain amount of control,” Roocroft said. “We have ride animals and show animals. . . . To keep elephants in captivity, you have to have some kind of control over them.”

Roocroft said it is particularly important to have absolute control over elephants that come into contact with the public. However, only the more malleable Asian elephants, not the Africans such as Dunda, are used for elephant rides, he said.

Myers, head of the Zoological Society, said greater discipline is needed for elephants kept in large herds such as the ones being developed at the Wild Animal Park. Otherwise, one elephant, rather than a keeper, will become dominant, he said. The park now has 19 elephants; nine in the African section and 10 in the Asian. There are six elephants in a single, smaller enclosure at the zoo.

“When you deal with elephants in large herds, there has to be a certain routine and discipline to enable people to walk among the elephants,” Myers said. “Lots of zoos don’t let their people walk among the elephants at all.”

Heuschele, of the Zoological Society, said there should be no permanent physical damage to the elephant.

He said he examined the elephant about six weeks after the incident and found “swelling of the upper part of the head and around the eyes.” He found cracks in the skin that may have occurred “subsequent to the swelling,” he said, adding that elephant skin heals very slowly.

“The whole program at the Wild Animal Park requires that every elephant be tractable,” Heuschele said. “The animals must conform to the standard.” Dunda has now become “very fully tractable,” he said.