Sacred Elephants

Favorite Photos: Longer Lashes Naturally

2010-03-17T19:08:53-07:00

Longer Lashes Naturally, originally uploaded by Marsel van Oosten.

I have a thing for close-up photography. It's so intimate and tangible. But how does one get this close to madame elephant without a blink, a blur, or a very tall ladder? Photographer Marsel Van Oosten explains how he captured this spectacular picture of an elephant's eye on his Flickr page.

JoAnne Worley Sings Her Heart Out for Elephants in "They Don't Want to Be in Show Business"

2010-03-10T18:29:14-08:00

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PR Log (Press Release) – Mar 02, 2010 – A new music video, made just for elephants, has been released. Jo Anne Worley of "Laugh In" fame is the diva on the mic.

"I have a big mouth, and I'm sorry to say I've always had one. When I was young, in church, I never sang with everybody else. I only mouthed the hymns, so I wouldn't drown everyone else out," Worley says. Now in the new music video 'They Don't Wanna Be in Show Business' she is speaking up and singing loud and clear for elephants in zoos and circuses. "I don't believe any animal should be used for entertainment--that includes whales AND elephants."

Producer Patty Shenker was inspired to make the music video for animals. "I decided that I wanted to make a fun, but educational video to put on YouTube about animal issues," she says.

Jo Anne Worley continues to perform today in several acting circuits in New York and Los Angeles. She most recently played Madame Morrible in the Los Angeles production of the musical 'Wicked.'

Worley is currently President of 'Actors and Others for Animals.'

Elephant News

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Mohr Productions, Inc. produces television and film projects for Broadcast TV, Internet, and Theater distribution. Production clients include: Paramount, MTV, Universal, Nickelodeon, HBO, and SyFy Channel. www.mohr-productions.com

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Save the Elephants Research Camp & Elephant Watch Camp Destroyed by Flood

2010-03-04T19:59:37-08:00

Thank you Barbara Shepler for alerting me to this breaking news.

I am deeply saddened to report that my elephant conservation friends Iain and Oria Douglas-Hamilton, founders of Save the Elephants, had their research center and eco-camp destroyed by a tsunami-like flood in Samburu, Kenya today.

Save the Elephants - Media Release
Nairobi, 4 March 2010

STE Research Camp Hit by Floods

Early this morning Save the Elephants (STE) research facility and Elephant Watch Safari Camp located in Samburu National Reserve, Kenya, were completely destroyed by unexpected flooding of the Ewaso Ng’iro River, along with seven other neighbouring lodges.

At approximately 5am this morning, a wall of water akin to a Tsunami surged through Elephant Watch Camp, catching tourists and staff unawares and sweeping away tents and facilities. It has been confirmed that camp owner Oria Douglas-Hamilton and guests managed to escape to safety by climbing to higher ground. Several members of staff were trapped in trees until the water subsided later today.

At approximately 7am the flood hit and decimated Save the Elephants’ research facility down river. Researchers and staff managed to drive to safety within seconds of the flood waters surging through the facility.

News just in confirm scenes of devastations at both facilities, with beds, tents, computers and vital research documentation submerged in mud and strung up in the treetops. Over 200 people watched from a hill above the camps as the waters wrecked havoc.

Staff and researchers hastily salvaged computers and camera equipment, but reports confirm that key research data, computers, equipment, kitchen facilities and food, lodging and personal effects have been washed away.

Although it is too early to asses the cost of the damage, Operations Manager Lucy King expects it will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to rebuild the facility, and Save the Elephants is now calling on the generosity of donors and interested parties to kick start the effort.

The immediate relief process has already begun, with blankets and water flown in by STE founder Iain Douglas-Hamilton this morning, as well as the assistance of the British army which is attempting to airlift people to safety and bring additional supplies.

The waters have currently receded to the point where staff are able to wade through the remnants of the facilities and retrieve what is left of their belongings.

Ominously, heavy rain clouds hang over Samburu and more heavy rains are expected as early as this evening at what is only the start of Kenya’s rainy season.

Please note that news updates on the flooding will be posted on the STE website. To donate to STE’s rebuilding effort, please go to www.savetheelephants.org

For all media enquiries please contact:

Lucy King: +254 (0)720 275561

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This is a terrible loss for all the people involved, as well as elephants world-wide. Meeting Iain and Oria is one of the reasons I went to Kenya a few years ago. They are an inspiration to me for their elephant conservation work, but also as an amazing family.

Oria is a matriarch for me. I love her sense of eco-chic Swahili style. I feel a sense of kindred spirit with her. Secretly, I wish she'd adopt me (my real mom passed away) but I never had the nerve to gush so openly before.

I was so happy in Samburu. My heart and body felt that I'd found my true home.

Oria's Elephant Watch Camp was so beautiful. It was even featured in Architectural Digest in 2007. Positioned right on the Ewaso Nyiro River, it didn't stand a chance against today's flood.

The Save the Elephants research center was a 5-minute drive from the camp, so this was a terrible flood indeed. Below is a photo of the research department. Those are elephant bones lined up out front.

One of the main goals of their work is mitigating human elephant conflict. Save the Elephants has done ground-breaking work in tracking the migratory routes of elephants with GPS collars. As human populations swell, inevitably they build homes and farms in the path of elephants and conflicts arise when the elephants pass back through.

You really can't teach a wild elephant to not eat crops and it's not easy to keep elephants away. So hopefully we can teach humans to build their communities away from known elephant migration routes and find ways of conserving, rather than killing elephants over competition for resources.

It seems that the flooding is still at a dangerous stage, so there's no telling what the damages and losses of research data are. Their entire situation seems dire. This article, Floods Destroy Property in Samburu Park, explains that the neighboring lodges (Samburu-Serena, Intrepids, and Larsen) were also submerged. Rescue crews are on the job. The bigger job will be in starting over and rebuilding a new center to save the elephants.

Donations can be made to one of the addresses on the Save the Elephants Donation page.

Two Tons of South African Ivory Seized in Thailand

2010-03-04T13:02:42-08:00

Thank you Bush Warriors for alerting me to this story.

GENEVA, Switzerland, March 2, 2010 (ENS) - Thai customs officials have seized two metric tonnes of elephant tusks hidden in pallets at Bangkok's main airport, a customs department statement said Thursday.

The shipment of 239 tusks originated in South Africa and arrived in Thailand on an Emirates flight from Dubai destined for Laos. Acting on a tip, officials arrested a Thai national when he tried to pick up the cargo, labeled "mobile phone parts," at Suvarnabhumi Airport.

The seized ivory, weighing 2,075 kilos, has an estimated sale value of 120 million baht (US$3.6 million).

Customs official Seree Thaijongrak said this is "the biggest seizure we have ever had." He said smuggling of ivory from Africa is on the rise in Thailand, as it is in much of Southeast Asia.

Thaijongrak said the seizure shows that Thailand is becoming a key transit point for shipments from Africa to supply the demand for ivory goods in China, Europe and the United States.

Conservationists say the seizure is evidence that there has been an increase in illegal trafficking because Parties to the UN's Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, CITES, may approve additional legal trading in ivory at their upcoming meeting March 13-25 in Doha, Qatar.

Governments that are Parties to the CITES treaty meet about every three years to set rules for international trade in wildlife species and their parts, including elephants.

CITES Parties banned trade in elephant ivory in 1989 by placing elephants on Appendix I of the treaty, which prohibits trading. Before the ban, illegal and legal ivory exports amounted to an estimated 770 metric tonnes or 75,000 elephants, annually.

In addition to the ban, current CITES rules also include a nine-year moratorium from 2007 on trade in ivory from elephant populations already in Appendix II, which allows trading under a permit system.

CITES meetings have been bitterly divided over elephant conservation and international trade in ivory. Elephant range countries with large government-held stockpiles of ivory want to sell the valuable material legally.

A group of other countries, and many conservationists, oppose legal ivory sales believing that they provide a cover for illegal elephant poaching and illegal ivory sales.

Cynthia Moss of the Amboseli Elephant Research Project in Kenya sums up the conservationist viewpoint, saying, "It is very discouraging having to fight the battle to save elephants once again. The 1989 ban helped elephants to recover in most parts of Africa. Now even in Amboseli we're losing elephants to ivory poachers for the first time in many years. The sale of any ivory, legal or not, is creating demand. No one needs ivory. It is a beautiful substance, but the only ones who need it are elephants."

At the upcoming CITES meeting in Doha, Tanzania and Zambia are seeking authorization to trade in some 110 metric tonnes of legally stockpiled ivory.

Another proposal submitted by the Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Rwanda and Sierra Leone opposes such trade for at least 20 years. This proposal would extend the nine-year moratorium to all elephant populations and eliminate export of worked ivory products from Namibia and Zimbabwe.

The debate between the opposing sides has been so hot and heavy that CITES Secretary-General Willem Wijnstekers says it has "degenerated into some unwarranted and unjustified attacks upon the objectivity of the UN's CITES Secretariat."

In an unusual letter of clarification posted on the CITES website, Wijnstekers said Friday, "a number of published statements bringing the Secretariat into disrepute that cannot be allowed to go unchallenged."

Wijnstekers deals with three allegations claiming that the CITES Secretariat is biased in favor of legal ivory trading.

He says the nine year moratorium decision was adopted on the basis of a written document submitted by Chad and Zambia on behalf of Africa that was drafted on the sidelines of the 2007 CITES meeting by the African elephant range states themselves.

"The CITES Secretariat was not involved at all in its drafting. Consequently, the allegations I have read, which suggest that the Secretariat somehow manipulated the wording to alter the scope of a moratorium, are wholly without foundation," said Wijnstekers.

Wijnstekers says although the Secretariat has commented on the proposal to stop ivory trading for 20 years, he is waiting to comment on the proposals of Tanzania and Zambia for an expert report due in the next few days.

The Panel of Experts was convened on the instructions of the 2007 Conference of the Parties to evaluate factors on the ground in Tanzania and Zambia such as elephant population numbers, conservation management measures and trade controls.

"Immediately thereafter, as required in the text of the Convention, the Secretariat will provide its comments on the proposals submitted by those two countries," Wijnstekers said.

"Whatever the Secretariat's final comments on the proposals may be, they will be based upon objective assessments, using the criteria that CITES Parties themselves have adopted and that reflect the provisions and principles of the Convention," pledged Wijnstekers. "Here again, the Secretariat has been and continues to be entirely impartial."

African Elephants currently live in 37 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

The Red List of Threatened Species maintained by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, IUCN, lists African elephants as Near Threatened based on an "inferred decline" of 25 percent in elephant numbers between 1979 and 2007 but does not give population numbers.

Press Release from Environment News Service (ENS) 2010.

Lessons from Ganesh: The Horizon

2010-02-24T01:33:31-08:00

Just as the defined edges of your future are beyond you, so too are the boundaries of your past behind. Where you came from is not relevant here, only the person you have become. There are insights and answers inside you for questions that may never be asked. Mysteries that may never be unlocked. Lessons that need not be understood. My love for you is ever present. You shall not walk alone. As the sun rises, I will shine for you. As it sets, I am your lantern. Your heart knows the way home.

Of Course, Elephants Can Swim. They Even Have Built-in Snorkles.

2010-01-16T14:43:47-08:00

Elephant Swimming by Steve Bloom. 36x24 Art Poster Print $4.95

Not only do elephants love splashing & rolling around in the mud, but they're good swimmers, too. They can swim across rivers and lakes. Elephants can even swim across long distances. For example, have you ever wondered how elephants ended up inhabiting the Southeast Asian island of Sri Lanka? Experts speculate that they swam across the ocean from Southern India. Check out this beautiful video of elephants swimming!

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Favorite Photos: Elephant [in graphite & watercolor]

2009-12-21T17:27:05-08:00

Carson's recent exhibitions include Telling Stories out of School: Midwest Illustrators Arthur Geisert, Kevin Henkes and Tina and Carson Kugler April 11, 2009 - June 21, 2009 at the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum in Neenah, WI, and a gallery show at Stumpjack Coffee in Two Rivers, WI from March-May 2009.

Carson has storyboarded on a number of well-known cartoons, most notably as a storyboard director for Nickelodeon's SpongeBob Squarepants and Hey Arnold. He is available for both freelance illustration and storyboards...and is currently looking for representation in illustration. If you are interested in purchasing art or setting up a gallery show, contact Carson at carsonkugler(at)sbcglobal(dot)net.

Favorite Photos: Gangaur Festival Elephants

2009-12-11T20:50:12-08:00

Sacred elephants on parade during the Gangaur Festival, Jaipur, India. If you click through on the image, you can view the rest of his colorful Indian elephant photographs.

Discovering the Sacred Symbols and Powers of Ganesh

2009-12-06T14:32:43-08:00

Each Ganesh temple carving, statue, or painting you see is slightly different. The elephant-faced deity Ganesha has 4 arms, showing his capable powers at helping humanity. His hands hold a wide variety of symbolic objects that show us what those powers are. His type of throne varies, as do the objects at his feet. Each symbol carries a message for you from Ganesh.

A friend was appreciating and indulging my adoration for elephants and bestowed a Ganesha gift upon me, a diminutive statuette, the kind Hindus carry with them for good luck when they travel. Immediately, I noticed that Ganesha is sitting on a conch shell with his little mouse friend nearby. I seldom see Ganesh using the shell as his throne. Looking closer with a magnifying lens, I looked to see what was in his tiny hands. What hidden meanings does this Ganesh hold?

You may or may not know that I am not Hindu. Yet since I was a very young child, I've been inexplicably drawn towards East Indian art and culture. While other preteen girls wanted Barbie dolls from Toys R Us, I wanted nothing more than for my mother to take me to Cost Plus (now World Market) in San Francisco so I could scour through their treasure chest of incense and brass candle holders, saris and bangles. It's fair to say that I was drawn by the art first and the religion second. In my thirst for spiritual understanding, I've read some books on Hinduism, but I'm not scholarly. I'm a seeker of direct experience.

My relationship with Ganesha is a personal one. In my twenties, I visited a temple with an enormous wooden Ganesh. He was immense, standing at least a foot taller than me, and covered with flowers and coins that devotees had left as offerings. As is my way, I playfully whispered a greeting to him. Then something came over me. A warm and powerful wave of energy. I felt spiritually "hugged." Thus began our relationship. I turn to Ganesha as a father figure and friend. When I feel small and unprotected, he comforts me. When I'm taking myself far too seriously, I feel his amusement. I most definitely feel his big elephant trunk nudging and prodding me along my path. I try to listen and learn from him. The meditations I write here, Lessons from Ganesh, are borne out of that listening.

There is a marvelous book called Loving Ganesha by Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami that the Himalayan Academy has uploaded in its entirety for you to read on-line. Although I haven't read very much of it yet, I like the author's writing style. It's geared towards a modern person's way of thinking and written in plain English. It's such a large body of work (592 pages) that a paperback copy is on my shopping list, but I'm grateful that the academy made it available for free on-line.

In that book, there is a terrific chapter on Ganesha's Sacred Symbols. The following quotes are excerpts that demystify the meaning of the gift I received.

Shankha, Conch
Ganesha listens to the puja conch's loud sound, reminding Him of elephants' trumpeting happily in the jungle. He summons, "Come one and all to Me and pray."

Mushika, Mouse
Ganesha's companion, a mouse, attests to the all-pervasiveness of the elephant God. Mushika, the mount or vahana, carries Him into the mind's every nook and cranny.

Gada, Mace
Loving Ganesha is decisive and commanding, as symbolized by gada, His mace. He casts karmas back on devotees for resolution, never letting up until completion.

Pasha, Noose
Loving Ganesa's provident mind, like the noose, draws close those He loves most dearly and reaches out to encircle and save strayed ones in extraordinary ways.

I love how the symbol of the beckoning conch shell reminds Ganesh of happily trumpeting elephants! What a beautiful calling. The mouse is a good reminder that God is in the details, too. I suppose the mace is Ganesha's tough love. He is a thorough teacher. The conjures up images of being in Ganesha's rodeo. This little lamb could use tending. So very sweet. A wonderful gift!

Lessons from Ganesh: Rest in These Arms

2009-12-01T13:18:53-08:00

Brave warrior, set down your sword. Lay down your shield. There are roses all around you. No need for supplication here. Valiant and graceful, you need not earn your keep. There is room enough here for you. Lay your weary head down and sleep. The cobra strikes but three times, after that she weeps. Save your honor for those whom delight in you. Save your fight for when called upon. The gates of these temples are open for you. Rest in these arms until dawn.