Dead Elephants

[Deepwater6]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/20/world/asia/hong-kong-ivory-tusk/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

 

This is a story greed and the kind of story that makes me feel ashamed to be part of human race, but I have a few questions maybe you guys can help me with.

 

1. Does anybody know how many Elephants 8000 #'s of ivory equates to? (Approximate)

 

2. This may be a stupid question. Why can't poachers hit the Elephants with tranquilizer drugs/darts and saw off the ivory? Would the Elephant die without it's tusk's? Obviosly a bullet would be faster for the poachers, but it's such a waste and it's so ignorant.

[Guest MacPhee]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/20/world/asia/hong-kong-ivory-tusk/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

 

This is a story greed and the kind of story that makes me feel ashamed to be part of human race, but I have a few questions maybe you guys can help me with.

 

1. Does anybody know how many Elephants 8000 #'s of ivory equates to? (Approximate)

 

2. This may be a stupid question. Why can't poachers hit the Elephants with tranquilizer drugs/darts and saw off the ivory? Would the Elephant die without it's tusk's? Obviosly a bullet would be faster for the poachers, but it's such a waste and it's so ignorant.

 

Elephants have tusks which furnish ivory. A useful and prized commodity by humans. But random ivory-collection is wasteful.

 

Couldn't we get the ivory by setting up elephant-farms. On such farms, the elephants would be fed calcium-rich nutrients, to foster swift tusk-growth. The tusks would then be harvested, say bi-monthly, so providing a lucrative export-trade for African countries.

 

This trade need not cause any distress to the elephants. They would be well-fed, and left to roam "free-range" within the farm, which could be quite extensive in area.

 

They'd just have their tusks clipped periodically. What would be wrong with that? After all, we keep flocks of sheep, and clip their fleece. No-one has yet suggested that this is an outrage, so why shouldn't we do a similar thing with elephants?

[Moontanman]

Elephant tusks are teeth, they have a huge nerve running down the center, cutting off the tusk of a living elephant would be a lot like cutting off your teeth....

 

I couldn't find a cross section of an elephant's tusk but this is a mammoth and seems to be the same...

 

 

 

Notice the nerve center goes almost all the way to the end...

[Turtle]

...They'd just have their tusks clipped periodically. What would be wrong with that? After all, we keep flocks of sheep, and clip their fleece. No-one has yet suggested that this is an outrage, so why shouldn't we do a similar thing with elephants?

 

tusks do not re-grow.

[Guest MacPhee]

Sigh, isn't it always the same - a perfectly good speculation gets spoiled by the introduction of facts!.

 

Thank you! :(

[Deepwater6]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-20685843

 

Click half way down the side of the picture to bring up the scroll arrow.

 

According to the caption below one of the pictures, elephant population is still in rapid decline. I think it's great they find and prosecute anyone who poaches and transports ivory, but the damage is done.

 

More attention needs to be put into keeping them alive. We must find a way to protect them as they roam those long distances.

Edited December 14, 2012 by Deepwater6

[Deepwater6]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21352722

 

Out of control. With such an Asian appetite extinction is a possibility.

[Moontanman]

Elephants are intelligent beings, killing them for ivory is a lot like killing humans for shrunken heads...