The Pinnewala Sanctuary is just off the main road from Colombo to Kandy, and is one Sri Lanka’s most popular animal attractions. Although the conditions of the elephants are in general better than some other establishments in the region, the welfare of the animals is a cause for concern for many experts.
The site at Pinnewala covers 25 acres, and was founded in 1975 with five young elephants. There are now around 60 animals, ranging from those born at the facility to some estimated at 40 years old or more. The main site itself has a couple of restaurants / refreshment stands, and some management buildings (eg. sleeping sheds), but little other infrastructure.
The animals spend the night in the main site, and in the mid-morning they are led down to the Maha Oya river, around 500 metres away, for a two hour bathing session. This walk takes them down the main street of town which is lined with gift shops, stalls, restaurants and other tourist facilities. During the bathing sessions tourists can watch the animals playing in the river and being washed by the keepers. More adventurous visitors are encouraged to touch the animals under the supervision of a mahout (elephant trainer), who expects a tip for this service.At around noon the animals are led back through town to the main site, where they are left to graze for a few hours whilst tourists can watch from a distance. At this time the baby elephants are brought to a feeding shed where they are given milk from bottles whilst tourists watch. In the middle of the afternoon the elephants are led down to the river again for another bathing session, and a few hours later they are led back to the main site for the night.
Whilst many animal sanctuaries include some tourist access, often as a source of funds, there is always a difficult balance to be struck between making decisions for the benefit of the animals, and making them for the benefit of the tourists. In addition, sanctuaries vary substantially in the care that they provide and the welfare of the animals that they hold.
The elephants at Pinnewala are not kept permanently chained, but it is often possible to see individual animals chained, often in distressing circumstances. It is known that adult males at Pinnewala are usually tied up during ‘musth’. Musth is a condition experienced by adult male elephants, characterised by high levels of testosterone, which happens about once a year and lasts for a few weeks. During this time the animals experience increased sex drive and may roam longer distances than usual – a combination of behaviours that in the wild can lead to vital genetic dispersal.
In captive elephants, however, the confinement and limitations on sexual activity can lead to aggression and destructive tendencies. For this reason, males are often tied up when in musth, which frustrates and distresses them further, making them even more difficult to manage. Hence the practice often gets to the stage where the animals may be tied by three limbs for weeks on end as the facility does not have any other methods for managing them. This clearly compromises the welfare of the animals.It is also easy to see the mahouts on site, carrying the ‘ankus’, the traditional elephant training tool. This long stick has sharp metal points at one end, which are used to control the elephant. Whilst these may be used irregularly, it is this threat of pain that makes elephants trainable, and hence makes it possible to herd the animals around the site and down to the river on a daily basis. When asked, mahouts in most places will generally say that although they have an ankus they very rarely use it – unfortunately this is not always the case. The training, threatening and herding of animals in this way, although practised throughout Asia, shows that the animals’ welfare cannot be given the highest priority, as one would hope from a facility calling itself a sanctuary.
Elephants do not breed well in captivity, and despite the longevity of the animals, no captive populations have ever been self-sustaining – new animals from wild populations have always been needed. In this context, Pinnewala has a very successful record of captive breeding. Nonetheless, two of the babies born at the facility in 2004 did not survive – one was born dead, and the other died when it was dashed on the ground by its mother shortly after the birth.
