How Do You Weigh an Elephant?
Posted at 7:36 am October 11, 2006 by Fred Bercovitch
Our little girl now tops the scale at a bit over 250 pounds (113 kilograms) at just one month of age!! (Read Fred and Jeff’s previous blog, Happy One-week Birthday to Baby Elephant.) To put this in human terms, her growth rate is the same as if an infant was born weighing 7 pounds (3.2 kilograms), but, one month later, came in at 8 pounds (3.6 kilograms), all due to mother’s milk.
So how does the animal care staff manage to weigh elephants? We use a program of training through positive reinforcement. Elephants are rewarded for moving to specific places, but are not punished if they aren’t in the mood to do what we want. We get them to move to specific places using two main techniques. First, like your dog or cat, they all have a name and we call them by name. When they come, we reinforce their behavior with a treat or praise. Second, we use a whistle to let them know exactly when they are doing something well. When they come to us after we whistle, they frequently receive a reward. The whistle is the type you might find in a pet store, but we have changed the frequency so that we can hear the sound. Our animal care staff (including Curtis, Keith, John, Erin, and Mindy) toot the whistle, call the name, and, after a lot of patience, manage to get the elephant to move to a certain place. One of these places has a special scale, kind of like a truck scale that is built into the ground, so the elephant stands on the scale while we read the weight. Because the elephants have been trained so well, we can separate Umngani from her calf, weigh them separately, and reunite them without a problem. So we are tracking the growth of the baby, as well as her mom, by simply asking them to step on the scale for a minute!
Now to answer some questions that have popped up:
1) The baby should have a name soon. We have to find a name that the King of Swaziland likes, sounds good in both English and Siswati, which is the national language of Swaziland, and is meaningful to us. Thanks for all of the suggestions.
2) We are breeding the elephants in captivity as part of a worldwide effort to maintain genetic diversity in captivity and enable people to come to zoos to see elephants for generations to come. Our program was developed with the cooperation and help of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums.
3) Elephants can sleep standing up, but the ones at the Wild Animal Park, and in the wild, often lie down to catch some ZZZs.
4) Umngani spends a lot of time with both Lungile and Litsemba because they are two of her best friends in the herd. Mabu and the other elephants now spend most of their time together as a herd of 9 elephants, even at night. So Mabu has plenty of opportunity to be with his daughter.
5) Matt Anderson was able to record a ” rumble” given by Umngani to her baby, so now you can hear what it sounds like when a mom calls to her daughter.
Listen to Umngani’s rumble:
[audio:http://www.sandiegozoo.org/wordpress/wp-content/Umngani_rumble_to_baby.mp3]
Jeff Andrews is an animal care manager at the Wild Animal Park.
Fred Bercovitch is head of the Behavioral Biology Division of CRES.
Watch the Wild Animal Park’s elephant herd daily on Elephant Cam.
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October 11th, 2006 at 8:09 am
That was so cool hearing that rumble! I played it over and over. Thank you so much!
October 11th, 2006 at 10:08 am
What a cutie!! And it’s amazing that she’s already learning to go on the scale by herself at only a month old! Elephants are so smart!!! Are she and Moose interacting much, or is she still too little?? (On the Cam, it looks like she sticks close to her mama most of the time.) What wonderful animals! Thanks for sharing them with us!
October 11th, 2006 at 10:16 am
I love the new picture of the baby girl, she looks like a ballerina. Would love to see more pictures! Has she already learned to respond to the whistle? It appeared that she turned and went into the shed before her mother while I was watching a week or so ago.
On the cam the other day I noticed Musi investigate (through the fence, with his trunk) one of the keepers that appeared to be watching the herd. On National Geographic they explained that once an elephant smells your breath they will remember you for life. Does the new baby instigate interaction with the keepers? Elephants are much more vocal than I thought. Is there meaning to their other vocalizations?
October 11th, 2006 at 10:45 am
By the way, what a CUTE picture! She looks like she’s skipping!
October 11th, 2006 at 11:58 am
Thank you for the update on the sweet baby! I am so looking forward to hearing about her name…hope it is a sweet one!
October 11th, 2006 at 1:11 pm
I see that our baby girl is now with the herd! I just saw her on the elephant cam, when will you put up her picture there as well?
October 11th, 2006 at 4:15 pm
Thanks for the update on our baby elephant, she certainly looks like she is having fun. Glad to hear that they are all getting along well enough that they all get to spend the day and night together. I can’t wait to hear what her name is, looking forward to hear from you when you finally choose. I love watching her on the elephant cam, it is a treat to see them all.
October 12th, 2006 at 8:19 pm
Informative, heart-warming, and thanks for the rumble!
October 13th, 2006 at 3:53 pm
Wow! Debra (#8) really said it best. I have heard my cats talk to their kittens in a ” burble” reserved for their babies alone. Is it that way with this particular rumble?
October 15th, 2006 at 2:10 pm
Love your elephants!! Thanks for letting us view them daily and watching the baby grow.
October 20th, 2006 at 1:36 pm
Were all the female elephants who have had or will have babies impregnated naturally? Or have you ever artificially inseminated any of your elephants?
November 4th, 2006 at 8:27 am
I love the picture of the little girls! It’s like she’s doing the Hokey-Pokey! I can’t wait til her picture’s up on the Elephant main page. Any indication of when a name will be chosen?
November 4th, 2006 at 4:54 pm
The rumble sounds nice, thanks for sharing all this with fans from across the country, even the new ones like myself. It is so nice to see the baby and the other elephants on the web cam. Can’t wait till she has a name.
December 5th, 2006 at 5:03 pm
I can’t seem to find what the baby elephant’s name means. Could you please let me know.
Thanks, Pam
May 24th, 2007 at 3:13 am
I thought this is how you weigh an elephant not how to attract it? this web doesn’t really show how-do-you-weigh-an-elephant
April 7th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
i love elephants and cats and dogs and the zoo. love jenneh and kai and sherri