Report by Alan Roocroft on the Makhna Loki at the Theppakadu Elephant Camp
Mudumalai, India, from February 3, 2002 through February 6, 2002 for India Project for Animals and Nature

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February 3, 2002:

I arrived at the Theppakadu elephant camp, Mudumalai, at 9:00 a.m. My initial impression of the makhna was favorable. He seemed to be carrying good body weight, but I was told that he had been fed more than the other elephants at the camp.

A team of veterinarians from India Project for Animals and Nature (IPAN) led by Dr. James Mahoney, who under a High Court ruling had permission to treat the makhna, had been attending to the makhna’s various injuries for several days prior to my arrival. My task was to evaluate the condition of the makhna’s feet, begin whatever treatment was indicated, and also advise the Tamil Nadu State Forest Department of any improvements in his physical and psychological condition that I felt were necessary.

The makhna had a deep 2-inch wound/abscess that appeared to be possibly a gun shot wound or an old gore-wound that tracked down and upwards on his right shoulder. This wound has been flushed and debrided daily. On his right cheek he had an abscess track that also traveled upwards and inwards that appeared to be 4 inches deep when a catheter was used to probe.

Apparently there was some dialog between the officials that this cheek abscess was identified as the bullet entrance site by Heidi Riddle and Dr. Thomas Hilderbrand from Germany using an ultrasound location machine. Dr. Mahoney does not agree with this diagnosis since no such wound was present when he first treated the elephant three years earlier, and because ultrasonic readings in such an area of the body are not reliable. The entrance site was less than an inch in diameter. The elephant had various small wounds on his hind legs, some of which appeared to be healing. Number one nail on his rear right foot had what appeared to be a separation under the cuticle. This could possibly be an abscess but we haven’t examined it yet.

His front feet were by far the most perplexing issue. On initial examination it was hard to determine if the swellings in his front feet were the residual damaging effects of the capture technique where the tendons were damaged. I was told that tendons appeared through the skin. I will hopefully determine that over the next 10 days the extent of these capture injuries and chronic deformity.

Most of his nails in his front feet appeared to have some form of abnormality possibly caused by abscesses. Nail two on both front feet appeared to have the greatest .problems. Nail two on his front left appeared to have the most problematic deformity. They applied an oil after bathing Loki and treated that as a form of treatment. I believe it was coconut-based.

February 4, 2002:

The swelling on the makhna’s right cheek appeared to be increasing. This could be a bed sore rather than a bullet wound, due to pressure on this side of his face while he was forced to sleep in an uncomfortable position. The three veterinarians attended the sore areas on his right rear feet, right shoulder and front left foot. The object for me that day was to start “trimming” on his feet. They laid him down on his right side so I had good access to his front feet. I asked them over the course of the day if they could possibly train him to better lay down in the event we wouldn’t get much success with his compliance.

Nail 5 in his front foot has evidently had a previous abscess that has caused a “pocket” at the base of the nail that has at one time gone through to the center of the nail. Along the cuticle line, there was a lot of extra growth and layering of the skin. This was all removed and I reshaped the nail. The abscess in the nail appeared to have healed so in an attempt to correct the nail’s cuticle growth, I removed some of the tissue build-up in the center of the nail. My inclination after seeing the ground that he must travel over during the day was not to remove too much of the base of the nail so that he had sufficient tissue not to cause bruising in the future.

In my opinion the nail problem was a result of incorrect housing at night. He must be standing on a very hard surface, probably on an incline putting excessive pressure to the nails that caused internal abscess formation in the nails. I found out later that night that in fact his sleeping arrangements were totally inadequate for an animal of his size.

The other areas of treatment that we approached was for him lying down. His compliance was not 100%. The mahouts do not normally do this in an open field with the elephants. This we achieved, and he was kept in a lying position for about 20 minutes while the nails were completed. While he was lying down, I told the mahouts to touch him all over and to feed him sugar cane as a reward for his compliance and relaxed attitude. I reiterated to the mahouts that they continue to make him lie down to familiarize him with the process that will make our job a whole lot easier.

February 5, 2002:

After we performed the initial veterinary inspection and treatment, the makhna was laid down on his right side so we could attempt to trim on his front right foot. What we wanted to achieve was to have him lie down on different sides so we could approach different areas of his feet. We trimmed, debrided, and reshaped nails number 4 and number 5. Nail 4 had a flair on the left side which turned inward towards the foot. This was removed and reshaped. Nail 5 had an inactive abscess over the top of the nail at the cuticle line. The abscess was swollen over the nail and it traversed the left side. It created a path for the abscess to travel out and down through the soft tissue between the nails. The inactive abscess did not appear to have caused any problems to the nail itself.

When the mahouts arrived with the makhna prior to our inspection and treatment, they made reference that the elephant was limping and favoring his front right leg. We asked the mahouts to walk the animal around the inspection area so I could see if there was any favoring of his limbs. He did not appear to be favoring any of the legs on the flat ground. He did, however, have trouble negotiating things and upgrade inclines, like the walk he must travel on the way to his night sleeping area. This path that he must travel put a great deal of pressure on his front feet. How much permanent damage was actually done to the foot couldn’t be determined. But the great pressure he must put on nails number 4 on both feet while walking were the nails with the most damage. It seemed to be extremely uncomfortable for him. The movement up and down hill, particularly down hill, appeared to be causing him a lot of discomfort.

We met with the chief wildlife warden Mr. Ashok Uppreit. We had a candid conversation about the condition of the makhna and future husbandry and care of the makhna. We were joined afterwards by the warden’s rangers while we discussed modifications in the makhna’s night housing. I made reference to the obvious physical signs of discomfort that the makhna displayed that led me to believe that he spent, when he laid down, a greater degree of time on his right side when he slept. The observations that I have made have led me to believe these conclusions:

1. Excessive wear on nails 4 and 5 on the front feet has been caused by contact with hard ground while he’s lying down.
2. A tumor-like swelling on his right rear knee is caused by pressure on the ground when he continuously lies down, initially putting most of his body weight on that knee when he goes to lie down.
3. If the abscess in his right cheek is not a bullet wound, which some have speculated, then it is my professional opinion that this sore is the result of him lying in a very uncomfortable position at night, in the only position of his downhill sleeping area that he can negotiate. Another aspect of this opinion could also be that, because the amount of capture damage caused in his front feet while he was on the slope where he must sleep (and also defecate), it was only possible for him to lie on one side of his body because of the pain in these front feet.

The Wildlife Warden agreed that we could change his sleeping arrangements with the use of the camp’s tractor with no problems. The ground where the makhna sleeps could be flattened down and softened so that he could more easily rest on either side. I also made a note that the mahouts should also be aware of this since it is causing the elephant physical damage. They need to be paying more attention.

February 6, 2002:

On February 5, 2002, the Superior Court in Delhi overturned the High Court’s decision in Madras, and effective February 6, 2002, I understood the IPAN team was no longer allowed to enter the Theppakadu elephant camp to treat the makhna.

Arriving at the camp as usual at 9:00 a.m., the IPAN veterinarians and I were allowed, on the authority of the wildlife warden after some discussions, to treat the makhna. I did not know if we would be able to look at his feet again after this day. I paid particular attention to Nail 2 on his front left foot because there appeared to be an abscess over the nail site, a large hole that appeared to be healing, thanks to daily veterinary treatment. When I saw the area, my initial thoughts were the swelling was due to an abscess in the nail and that the infection had gone from the nail to his foot. This was a possible conclusion, however, we couldn’t know unless we could trim a little farther on this, but I was not sure if we would be allowed to get in again.

The makhna was made to lie down on his left side for Nail 2, so that I could have easy access to the area. The nail had evidently been infected earlier and there was some separation at the cuticle line. The abscess at this point appeared to be contained. I believe it had no relationship with the large wound that was six inches higher on his foot. My assessment of this wound was that it was probably due to heavy chain damage. I based this on the fact that some of the elephants in the camp had been fitted with long, heavy chains, maybe some 300 pounds, or 150-200 kilograms, of drag chains. The pressure from the chain around the makhna’s ankle and foot area caused injury and subsequent scarring.

I made the following recommendations:

• Level out the resting or lying-up area.
• Instead of chains, use a rope.
• Have a large enclosure constructed so the makhna could be free to move around within a safe and non-injurious situation.

Conclusions:

During my time at the Theppakadu elephant camp, I was able to observe, first-hand, elephant care, husbandry and management. Several of the elephants that I observed were in my opinion underweight for working elephants, leading me to believe that the camp’s feeding standard and feed amounts need to be reviewed. I found the mahouts I met cooperative and, along with a couple of Forest Department staff, willing to learn and to share knowledge. Traveling the world as I do consulting with knowledgeable elephant experts on all manner of elephant-related husbandry and care issues, and having come to India at considerable expense to offer my services at no charge, I find the lack of any spirit of cooperation at higher levels particularly disturbing. That my continuing treatment of the makhna was abruptly terminated by the authorities was not what I expected in a country whose image to the rest of the world is one of caring for animals, especially elephants.

Even so, I am willing to return to India and collaborate on any and all elephant care and other related elephant business if the authorities so wish.

-- Alan Roocroft, Elephant Care Specialist
with the San Diego Zoo for the San Diego Zoological Society

Thanks to Ms. Florence Lambert with the Elephant Alliance, La Jolla, CA., for covering Mr. Roocroft’s travel expenses, and to the San Diego Zoological Society for giving him time off to come to India and join the IPAN team for Loki.