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RETURN TO THE WILDS
preparing the captured elephant for its journey to its new home
TAMAN NEGARA (National Park)
Pictures & information courtesy to The Elephant Man

it can't go anywhere now.	why are they doing this to me?
building a road to the capture area	a restless elephant!
Cooling the body with earth	Feeding on bananas while waiting to be translocated
Rangers - Rosli & Safie - watch anxiously	Truck used to transport the captured wild elephant

Once the team is satisfied that the elephant is safely secured to the tree, warning signboards will be put up all
around the perimeter of the captured animal. This is consistently done with the full cooperation of the owners of the raided plantation where
security personnel are usually stationed to deter curious onlookers from getting too close
to the elephant. Although the elephant is chained at its front legs, it is still able to charge and possibly use its trunk
to endanger anyone that thinks the chain will hold the elephant! A road will quickly be built leading to the capture area for the team to bring in
its tamed working elephants to lead and pull out the captured elephant to an unloading bay
where a truck will then transport the animal to the release area in Sungai Cacing, Taman Negara.

The ECTU will request its office in Kuala Gandah to send 2 of its tamed working elephants - Cek Mek and Lokimala - on trucks to help in removing
the captured elephant. Both these female lephants are at least 60 years of age and are veterans to hundreds of translocation exercises in all
weather conditions.
Cek Mek, particularly, has the tendecy to gently calm the stressed captured elephant by using its trunk to feel and touch the elephant's mouth
and eyes!

In the earlier days of the unit, the ECTU learned translocating wild elephants from Assamese mahouts from north eastern India, using the
" Melaiseeka " or using lassos technique. Past elephants used were Indian elephants namely Lal Bahadur, Ganesh and Pol Bahadur as well as
Mek Bunga from Thailand - recently retired due to blindness.
The first three elephants were male elephants but only Lokimala survived and she is now helping out with the relocation exercise.
Cempaka, a Malaysian female elephant, was also used briefly, until she died of illness in 1975.

While this technique was suitable in India, it could not be applied successfully here due to the thick vegetation and undulating terrain of the
secondary forests in Malaysia. The capture team would ride on the indian elephants and
wade into the wild herd unoticed where only small wild elephants were chosen, captured and then tamed by the ECTU.This technique provided only
a few opportunities until the DWNP sent a few of its officers overseas to learn
and adapt the method in using tranquilisers. This method has been proven to be the most successful and is still being used until today.

Tamed working elephants are summoned to help in the translocation	Loading working elephants onto the truck
They look forward to the ride!	Here we go again!
Here we go.... Haji Aziz on Cek Mek with Mr Johari providing escort	Mek Bunga too with Mr Ibrahim taking charge of her!
The captured elephant is nervous!	Senior Ranger - Mr Rostam - prepares the waiting truck

Once the road has been built, a sloping hole big enough to accomodate an open truck is then dug up as it would be impossible to get a wild elephant to climb up the truck! Rangers will carefully prepare the truck as the journey to Taman Negara can easily take about 13 hours with a combined traveling time of overland on the truck and through Tasik Kenyir on a barge pulled by a tugboat.

Nowadays, captured wild elephants are released onto the new Gua Musang - Kuala Berang highway instead of using the slow and tedious journey on
rafts pulled by a tugboat!

Before the mahouts can approach the captured elephant, another round of tranquilisers will be given to the elephant. Enough dosage of Rumpon
or Xylazine will be given via a dart, which is to make the elephant drowsy and yet able to walk slowly on its feet while being lead and pulled by the
two working elephants.

Mahouts on both the tamed working elephants will slowly approach the darted elephants before outflanking it on either side where rangers will
quickly put chains over the captured elephant and secured to the 2 tamed elephants. Once this is done, the chains on the legs will be cut off from
the tree. The 2 tamed elephants will begin the slow process of leading and pulling the darted elephant towards the waiting truck.
Depending on the distance and size of the captured elephant, this process can easily take as much as 2 hours through the secondary forests.

There are cases where captured elephants collapse while being led to the waiting truck due to stress and heat,
One must remember that the elephant is used to roam free in the wilds and once captured, it will be chained to trees and the resulting attempts
to free itself will usually injure their legs. Sometimes, they get caught on their own chains resulting in accidental deaths.

A collapsed elephant will immediately be given a treatment of a dose of Reversin or a heart stimulant drug and then slowly nudged by the
tamed elephants so that it may stand on its own again. If the road is slippery, it will only make things worst but will never stop the dedicated
ECTU staff to get the elephant translocated!

Note ;
Revivon reverses the effects of Immobilon
Riversin reverses the effects of Rompun

mahouts nervously assess the captured elephant	Rompun or Xylazine is prepared to lightly sedate the elephant.
After 20 minutes, the elephant is approached by Cek Mek	Mek Bunga will join in flanking the captured elephant
Rangers must ensure that the captured elephant is safely secured to both the working elephants	And its then lead all the way to the loading bay!
sometimes, due to stress, the elephant might collapse.	They are finally on the truck

Before the sides of the truck are put up, the team will do a measurement of the height, length and width of the major parts of the capture elephant
for scientific purposes. While the elephant may have been drugged, it will still react violently if its senses are still awake and, hence, using the
services of the tamed elephants will greatly reduce the possibilities of danger for the team.

Secured & ready to be measured!	Measuring the body
Measuring the ear	Measuring the head
Measuring the height	Measuring body length
Measuring the feet	Measuring the tusk

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