Kaohsiung’s Shoushan Zoo has said that long-time elephant caretaker Chang Yung-hsing (張永興) is to retire next year and part with an African elephant named A-li (阿里) that he has cared for over the past 39 years.
Chang was 23 when first started caring for the then-five-year-old female elephant, zoo director Chuang Hsuan-chih (莊絢智) said.
“The man and the elephant share a profound rapport,” Chuang said.
Photo courtesy of Shoushan Zoo
Now 44, A-li is one of three African elephants in Taiwan and the only one in Shoushan Zoo. The other two are in Taipei Zoo.
Shoushan Zoo officials are concerned that Chang’s retirement could depress A-li and they have been familiarizing the elephant with her new caretaker over the past three years, Chuang said.
Captive elephants can become attached to their human caretakers and losing familiar caretakers can cause elephants to become depressed and refuse to eat until they starve to death, Chuang said.
“We hope to gradually reduce A-li’s emotional dependence on Chang,” she added.
A-li’s caretaker-in-waiting, Pai Po-yuan (白博元), said that although he has been Chang’s assistant for three years, the elephant has not entirely warmed up to him.
Although A-li understands that he is Chang’s occasional substitute, the staff still have to keep the elephant behind safety barriers when he cleans the enclosure or brings her food, Pai said.
“If I make a wrong move, my life could be in danger,” he said, adding that the situation is still an improvement over when A-li was throwing stones and dung at him.
National Dong Hwa University environmental science professor Kurtis Pei (裴家騏) has urged Shoushan Zoo to let A-li live with the elephants in Taipei Zoo as a humane alternative to solitude.
All three of the nation’s African elephants are females, which are naturally social, and it is inhumane to make A-li live without companionship, the Chinese-language Apple Daily quoted Pei as saying.
Taipei and Kaohsiung city officials said they agree that it would be preferable to let the elephants live together, but the elephants might not get along, as they are territorial and might resist being moved, the newspaper said.
Kaohsiung Tourism Bureau Director Tseng Tzu-wen (曾姿雯) said the bureau is interested in protecting the welfare of zoo animals and is willing to discuss the issue with Taipei Zoo, the newspaper said.
Taipei Zoo spokesman Chin Shih-chien (金士謙) said that the elephants at the zoo have lived together for decades and might not accept A-li, but the proposal has a lot of merit and deserves serious consideration, it said.
“No matter how difficult, this is an issue that is worth our colleagues at Shoushan and us expending some effort and trying to find a solution,” he was quoted as saying.
TRAFFIC SAFETY RULES: A positive result in a drug test would result in a two-year license suspension for the driver and vehicle, and a fine of up to NT$180,000 The Ministry of Transportation and Communications is to authorize police to conduct roadside saliva tests by the end of the year to deter people from driving while under the influence of narcotics, it said yesterday. The ministry last month unveiled a draft of amended regulations governing traffic safety rules and penalties, which included provisions empowering police to conduct mandatory saliva tests on drivers. While currently rules authorize police to use oral fluid testing kits for signs of drug use, they do not establish penalties for noncompliance or operating procedures for officers to follow, the ministry said. The proposed changes to the regulations require
Taipei, New Taipei City, Keelung and Taoyuan would issue a decision at 8pm on whether to cancel work and school tomorrow due to forecasted heavy rain, Keelung Mayor Hsieh Kuo-liang (謝國樑) said today. Hsieh told reporters that absent some pressing reason, the four northern cities would announce the decision jointly at 8pm. Keelung is expected to receive between 300mm and 490mm of rain in the period from 2pm today through 2pm tomorrow, Central Weather Administration data showed. Keelung City Government regulations stipulate that school and work can be canceled if rain totals in mountainous or low-elevation areas are forecast to exceed 350mm in
EVA Airways president Sun Chia-ming (孫嘉明) and other senior executives yesterday bowed in apology over the death of a flight attendant, saying the company has begun improving its health-reporting, review and work coordination mechanisms. “We promise to handle this matter with the utmost responsibility to ensure safer and healthier working conditions for all EVA Air employees,” Sun said. The flight attendant, a woman surnamed Sun (孫), died on Friday last week of undisclosed causes shortly after returning from a work assignment in Milan, Italy, the airline said. Chinese-language media reported that the woman fell ill working on a Taipei-to-Milan flight on Sept. 22
1.4nm WAFERS: While TSMC is gearing up to expand its overseas production, it would also continue to invest in Taiwan, company chairman and CEO C.C. Wei said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) has applied for permission to construct a new plant in the Central Taiwan Science Park (中部科學園區), which it would use for the production of new high-speed wafers, the National Science and Technology Council said yesterday. The council, which supervises three major science parks in Taiwan, confirmed that the Central Taiwan Science Park Bureau had received an application on Friday from TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, to commence work on the new A14 fab. A14 technology, a 1.4 nanometer (nm) process, is designed to drive artificial intelligence transformation by enabling faster computing and greater power
RSS