Hand-raising Orphan Asian Elephants

A Practical Guide

For Asian Elephant

Range Country Care Providers

Photo credit: Hollis Burbank-Hammarlund

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Why We Developed This Guide

PRESS RELEASE for Journalists

How Elephant Calves Become Orphans

There are many reasons why young elephants are orphaned. Human-elephant conflict is a major contributor.

Falling into ditches or wells, accidental electrocution, being caught in snares or hit by trains or vehicles, poisoned by agricultural chemicals--as well as natural disasters, such as floods--kill many wild Asian elephants, including mothers. Injured or weak elephant calves may be separated from their herd or abandoned. Unless humans step in to help, survival is unlikely.

Why This Manual is Needed

Hand-raising orphan elephants is challenging, especially if they have been injured. Even facilities with experience are not always successful. Many die within the first few months.

To date, there has been no comprehensive resource to provide practical and science-based information on how to care for orphan Asian elephant calves. Until now!

We have created a practical guide for veterinarians, veterinary technicians, mahouts, caregivers, and anyone else involved with elephant hand-rearing.

Written by an international team of Asian elephant health and welfare experts, the new Hand-Raising Orphan Asian Elephants guide includes veterinary protocols, step-by-step instructions, photos, videos, and a variety of healthcare and welfare tools to ensure young orphan elephants have the opportunity to thrive--and be returned to the wild!

From “First Encounter” to “Release Back to the Wild”—11 chapters in all. This new guide will give orphaned elephants a second chance. (Scroll down to see the list of chapters.)

Because we hope to reach a broad audience, we have tried to use clear and succinct language and have defined medical terms that may not be familiar to all.

We welcome feedback and will update this guide as new information becomes available.

Understanding the Basic Concepts of 'Good Welfare' is a Good Starting Point

To begin your journey towards a practical understanding of how to successfully hand-raise orphan Asian elephants--and achieve positive outcomes for their lifelong wellbeing--we encourage you to first review our slide show below. Click on the image below to start or click here to download a PDF version.

A collaborative project of:

Contributors & Reviewers

Dr. Susan K. Mikota - Veterinarian

Executive Director & Director of Veterinary Programs and Research, Elephant Care International (Read more)

Dr. Willem Schaftenaar - Veterinarian

Veterinary advisor to the Elephant Taxon Advisory Group (Europe) (Read more)

Dr. B. Vijitha Perera - Chief Wildlife Veterinarian, Department of Wildlife Conservation, Elephant Transit Home, Udawalawe, Sri Lanka (Read more)

Dr. Ellen Dierenfeld

Member, American Zoo and Aquarium Association’s Nutrition Advisory Group; Past President, Comparative Nutrition Society, and; Advisor to the online Handrearing Resource Center (Read more)

Dr. Bhaskar Choudhury - Veterinarian

Manager and Head Veterinarian at Wildlife Trust of India (Read more)

Dr. Khyne U. Mar - Veterinarian

Research Fellow, The University of Sheffield, Department of Animal and Plant Sciences (Read more)

Project Partner, Fundraiser, and

Website Producer

Hollis Burbank-Hammarlund

Founder/Director, Work for Wild Life International (Read more)

Funding Generously Provided By

Dr. Betsy Coville - Veterinarian

Coville-Triest Family Foundation

PHOTO CREDITS: Unless identified otherwise, all photographs featured in this Guide were taken by the above Contributors, Reviewers, and Website Producer and may only be used with permission.