Patra is a female African elephant who arrived at Shirotori Zoo from Africa in 1989 when she was just three years old. For more than 35 years, she has lived completely alone.
As part of Elephants in Japan’s latest investigation into the welfare of solitary elephants in Japan, we visited Shirotori Zoo to see how Patra was living. What we found was a life with little opportunity to behave like an elephant.
Patra’s indoor enclosure had bare concrete floors, no visible hay or bedding, and almost nothing to keep her active or interested. When we visited, Patra was locked inside even though the rain had stopped. Zoo staff explained that she had chosen to stay indoors earlier in the day, but once the weather cleared, she was not given the choice to go back outside. Outside, her enclosure was little more than hard-packed ground with a shallow pool. There was no shade from the hot sun and almost nothing that encouraged Patra to move around or use her mind the way elephants naturally do.
Instead, much of Patra’s day revolved around waiting for visitors to throw her food. The zoo actively sells food for visitors to feed her, and during our visit Patra repeatedly stood with her mouth open or stretched out her trunk in anticipation. Instead of spending her days searching for food and making her own choices, Patra waited for the next handful of food to be thrown into her enclosure.
Patra’s outdoor enclosure at Shirotori Zoo, Japan. The enclosure is surrounded by tall steel-bar fencing and consists mainly of sparse sandy substrate with little environmental complexity or natural vegetation.
We also observed other welfare concerns. Loud music from a nearby animal performance arena could be clearly heard from Patra’s enclosure, and her right ear appeared to be bent unnaturally forward. The outdoor barriers also appeared low enough that visitors, particularly children, could potentially reach into the enclosure.
In the wild, female African elephants rarely spend a day alone. They grow up surrounded by mothers, sisters, aunts, daughters, nieces, and lifelong friends. Together they walk for miles, raise their young, comfort one another, and share a lifetime of memories.
Patra has known the opposite. For almost her entire life, year after year, Patra’s world has been fences instead of forests, concrete instead of open land, and silence instead of the company of other elephants. Much of her day now revolves around waiting for visitors to throw her food.
No elephant should spend a lifetime like this. Patra deserves the chance to live with dignity as the intelligent, social being she is.
