Trainer
Chandra Man Tamang (on the left) and mahout Rajbir Chaudhary (on the
elephant) are training a young elephant to walk straight forward during
a WEPA workshop in Chitwan, Nepal.
Dr.
Kamal Gairhe, an expert in veterinary medicine, gives a lecture during
a WEPA workshop at Chitwan, Nepal.
Workshops provide an opportunity to share skills across cultures to both directions. Here, the old and respected Nepali mahout Bhaggu Tharu (second from right) and WEPA Director Helena Telkänranta (on the right) are showing each other the types of knots their cultures use on ropes in animal husbandry.
Marc Pierard and Dr. Andrew McLean of WEPA sharing a relaxed moment with a young elephant. Touching the tip of another elephant's trunk is a friendly signal in elephant behaviour, and when seeking to express the same to a human, an elephant typically reaches for a hand as a substitute for a trunk tip.
Dr.
Andrew McLean socializing with Kush Prasad, a young male elephant in
Chitwan.
A young
elephant called Saraswoti Kali is trained with the Positive Learning
Method to accept a rider climbing onto her. The trainer on the left is
Chandra Man Tamang, Head of the Hattisar (government elephant stable)
of Bardia. Observing on the right: Dr. Andrew McLean, Head of Science
and Training of WEPA; Buddhan Chaudhary, Head of the Hattisar of Koshi
Tappu; and Ranjana Pajiyar, assistant and interpreter for WEPA.
A
one-year-old elephant is getting habituated to feeling a weight on the
neck, which will later make it easy to train him for riding. In the
Positive Learning Method, some stages of training and habituating are
started already before the age of one year, when the elephent is very
receptive to new things, which makes trainign easier and cuts down the
overall training time.
A
one-year-old elephant is trained by Tuire Kaimio and Dr. Andrew McLean
of WEPA to walk forward on a cue. The cue is a touch at the same spots
behind ears on which the rider will later touch with his feet when
steering the grown-up elephant.
Elephant growth: Kumar Gaj, a young male at Bardia Hattisar, in a training session with Chandra Tamang and Laurie Pond as a one-year-old...
...and
the same elephant one and a half years later, rehearsing with his
mahout Mahesh Tharu (on the right) and Chandra Tamang (second from
right), supervised by Dr. Andrew McLean with translation by Ranjana
Pajiyar.