ELEPHANTS AT HOME

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 94, 22 April 1933, Page 17

ELEPHANTS AT HOME

AND OTHER WILD LIFE

The author of "Elephants," Commander David Enderby Blunt, is well qualified to discuss that animal. He naturally has a wide knowledge of elephant lore, having been for six years an "Elephant Control" official in the Tanganyika" Territory, shooting ninety of them in "seven months actual hunting . , . until tho elephants learned to behave themselves." One of his stories is of a starving shooting party who had no bait to catch fish and only one bullet left; their leader sighted an elephant and a bird; if he could hit the bird he would have "bait to catch all the fish he wanted, but if he could kill the elephant with one round' ho would have sufficient food for weeks. Ho killed the elephant." His object in writing, however, is to tell the public at home what elephantcontrol really is; in other words, the means by which alone it is possible for men and elephants to occupy the same country in a stato of peace and concord. But he does much more than this. Ho gives an account of the evolution and habits of tho elephant, discusses Ms jOwn experiences as a Cultivation Protector, gives a record of elephant-hunt-ers past and present, and makes many practical suggestions that will help the novico in qualifying for his task. His account of elephant habits is particularly interesting, and some of his statements quite surprising. For instance, he believes that elephants, instead _of swimming* across rivers, often sink themselves to the bottom and_ walk across tho river .bed'with the tips of their trunks hold above the water! Again, though we are. definitely told by Sclous that African elephants never lie down during their wholo life, yet the author assures us that they not only lie down, but actually make use of an anthill for a pillow. Also that when lying clown they sleep, and, more remarkable, they snore! He considers that the elephants in the zoo should .be provided with some sort of mound similar to an ant-hill for a pillow! His remarks on "control" are also very interesting. The elephant is tremendously destructive of crops and must bo mado-'to keep his distance., This is achieved by a kind of elephant-educa-tion. Tho country is divided into elephant areas and non-elephant areas. The elephant areas are the forests and waste tracts; the non-elephant areas are tho places under cultivation. In the elephant areas the animals remain undisturbed; in tho non-elephant nreas they arc shot at with the object of driving them into the elephant, areas. This shooting of tho herds is believed to educate the animals. When the non-clo-phant areas are made unhealthy for them, they learn that they must keep to their allotted territory.