00:00Mila came November 14, 2013.
00:06She is a very high-profile animal and very much loved throughout the whole of New Zealand.
00:11Mila is a very playful, engaging elephant.
00:15She had been alone for many years.
00:17Mila was the last exotic animal in a circus in New Zealand,
00:20but none of the other zoos in New Zealand would take Mila,
00:23and because that was Helen's mission was to give sanctuary to animals that no one else wanted, she accepted.
00:29Their goal was to find a facility that would take Mila,
00:33where she could spend the rest of her life not alone,
00:36but in a normal social group with other elephants.
00:38The bottom line was if we wanted her to be a stay-alone elephant,
00:42we could have used the funding just to keep her as a lone elephant in New Zealand.
00:47And so when we contacted the San Diego Zoo and asked them if they'd take Mila,
00:52it couldn't have been better. They said yes.
00:55I was hired to basically train Mila for transport,
01:00to get her ready with all of her medical testing,
01:03behaviors she would need to feel comfortable in flight,
01:06and to build a relationship with her that I can then pass on that relationship to her new home.
01:12On the day of the move, Mila was totally ready and she walked right into the crate.
01:18She's a very smart, very courageous elephant.
01:22She wasn't sedated or anything.
01:24We wanted her to have full capacity and to be able to balance herself on the truck and on the plane.
01:30The journey to the airport was just seamless.
01:33The police department looking after us and supporting us.
01:36The trucking company donated his time.
01:39The police had even arranged for the lights to stay green,
01:42so we didn't even have to stop at traffic lights.
01:45Perfect.
01:46She came to the San Diego Zoo on a charter flight, her own 747 from New Zealand.
01:52We'd raised the money to charter a 747-400 converted to a cargo plane.
01:58It was such a joy to be able to just go down, talk to her, fill up her water all the time,
02:04throw us some more carrots and more branches.
02:07Here we go.
02:35Because of the relationship that Erin and Al, our trainers had had with her, we were
02:42able to take the chains off immediately and get her to walk out of her crate immediately
02:48and she just started eating in quarantine, behaving normally straight away.
02:58Mila just came out of quarantine.
03:02The quarantine lasts about 8 weeks because we have to make sure she doesn't have tuberculosis
03:05and that takes 8 weeks to culture.
03:09So we are getting her used to our facility so every time they go into a new area we kind
03:13of just let them check it out, we walk them back and forth, show them what it's all about
03:18and then if she's comfortable with that we start running her through her regular routine.
03:23So one of the things we do with all 7 of our elephants every day is scrub their feet.
03:26So we ran her through that basic procedure that we do every day and that's just to keep
03:30their feet healthy and she did really great.
03:33Part of it is learning where that foothole is for her to put it through.
03:37She did great.
03:42The other things we like to do when we bring them out there is give them some of their treats
03:46and goodies.
03:47So we gave her some browse to eat and also her wheat bran which helps her digestive system.
03:52She likes that a lot so she knows then that that's a good place, she's going to get treats
03:56out there and she's going to want to come in there again.
04:00We're pretty much preparing her for life at the San Diego Zoo.
04:05The next step will be eventually getting her out into her yard where she'll be able to
04:10do what the other elephants do, spend most of the day out there, enjoy it and then after
04:15that we'll work on introducing her to the herd and hopefully she'll get along with everybody
04:20and become integrated into our herd of five female elephants.
04:26She hasn't seen another elephant for about 30 years so we really have no idea how she's
04:30going to react.
04:32So we have given her some of their feces in her stall so she can smell and kind of know
04:37and some of them she's reacted to, some of them she hasn't.
04:41So we'll kind of go from there with visual access and then we'll give them fence line access
04:46and hopefully get her out there sometime.
04:50Well it's important to remember that Mila has been alone for the last 35 years and the
04:53reason we brought her to San Diego was so she could have the opportunity to socialize
04:57with other elephants for the rest of her life so we're pretty unsure as to what her reaction
05:01would be and that's just something that we have to take through our power of observation
05:05and knowing elephant behavior.
05:07And the first interaction she had with Mary, our dominant elephant of the group, was she was
05:11a little unsure as to what Mary actually was.
05:14Seeing another animal just as big as her on the other side of the fence.
05:18It was a little unsure, a little wary, put her ears out which is definitely a sign of
05:23trying to figure out what that other animal was.
05:26She definitely wanted to interact with Mary, see if Mary was interested in seeing her back
05:33and a lot of it was really good observations knowing that Mila started to become comfortable
05:38with Mary right there with her.
05:41Seeing elephants is not a science, it's something that we have to take day by day, introduction
05:46by introduction.
05:48We initially start off by doing elephants in adjoining yards with barriers in between them,
05:53generally with small square meshing so that way they have the opportunity to touch one another,
05:58but it's nothing that can overwhelm.
06:00If the elephants are interested in one another, whether or not it's aggressive, whether or not
06:05the elephant is unsure, scared, nervous, we take that into account as to how long the
06:11interaction takes place and what we will do for our next step.
06:15If that continues to go well, we will move the elephants to an area where the barrier between
06:21them is a lot more open, giving them more interaction to touch each other, giving them more access
06:26to one another, which can cause again more positive interactions because elephants are very tactile.
06:31They definitely communicate with one another by touching, feeling, communicating, smelling.
06:37And we just watch to make sure that that's comfortable for both elephants.
06:41If they're both together for most of the interaction, that's very positive, that's something that we
06:45do want to see.
06:46But also if they decide to walk away, that's good information for us to gauge whether or not
06:50they're still interested, whether or not they're frustrated with the interaction at that point.
06:56And again, based off of how that goes over the course of a certain period of time, again,
07:00there's no science to it, will help us gauge whether the interactions between barriers or
07:05if we're seeing that the elephants are ready to be together in the same space.
07:09This morning at the San Diego Zoo's Elephant Odyssey, we introduced our 41-year-old African female
07:17Mila, who came to us from New Zealand with our oldest female Asian elephant, Mary.
07:23And we took Mila out first this morning, let her get comfortable.
07:29Mary walked up to Mila, and they both started eating out of the same tree.
07:32This is a great behavior to see because they were both calm.
07:36They were both acceptive of each other.
07:38And those are the type of things that we wanted to see.
07:41And as the morning went on, we saw Mary following Mila around.
07:46And that's pretty normal because Mary's our matriarch of our female group.
07:50And so she's telling Mila that, hey, I'm in charge, I get to eat where I want.
07:53And Mila accepted that and moved on, which is another great behavior.
07:57Female elephants need socialization.
07:59They need to be with other elephants.
08:01So by coming here to the San Diego Zoo's Elephant Odyssey, she's going to have a chance
08:05to mingle with five other elephants.
08:08And as far as an elephant go, it doesn't get any better than that.
08:11We're very happy with Mila's introduction today.
08:13We added Shaba into the mix, our youngest female African elephant today, to see if her confidence
08:20has built up.
08:21Shaba's a very shy elephant.
08:23She's generally unsure about newcomers.
08:26Today was one of the first interactions she had by touching Mila without being scared
08:31or nervous.
08:32And that's a huge step in the right direction, something that we're very happy about for both
08:36Mila and Shaba.
08:37Well, we never know what's going to happen with these introductions, but Shaba came out
08:41and immediately let Mila know that her food is Shaba's food, which is normal for elephants.
08:50And then they ate for quite a while and it was just kind of a standoff to see, you know,
08:54you're okay, I'm okay.
08:56It's just getting to know you as far as elephants go.
08:59So our next step now is just to continue this process.
09:03It could take weeks of doing this every day for them to finally start getting close to
09:08each other and go, okay, you're not so big, you're not so scary.
09:12And then we'll also use Mary, who Mila's already developed a relationship with as maybe
09:18an anchor, somebody to settle things down, which Mary is a matriarch and that's what
09:22we would expect.
09:24We put Mary, Shaba and Mila together for about 15 minutes this morning so they can get settled
09:29in.
09:30And then we put Sumithi, the 47-year-old Asian female, in with them in the morning now for
09:34a couple hours.
09:35So now Mila is in with a group of four elephants for a couple hours a day and we'll start just
09:40easing her into it and she'll get more comfortable as time goes.
09:44And so far things are going great.
09:46Mila come.
09:47She's doing well.
09:48She's still, you know, nervous a little bit but it's really waning a lot.
09:52She's starting to feel more and more comfortable.
09:57They really want to hang out with each other.
09:59It's just a matter of slowly and letting them develop their relationships slowly, methodically
10:05and we'll do this over the next year.
10:12Debbie is one of our youngest elephants.
10:14She just turned 37.
10:17One way that you can tell Debbie apart from the rest of the group is she does have a small
10:20stumpy tail.
10:21That's something she was born with so it's not something we're very concerned about.
10:25She is a tall, lean elephant.
10:27You can tell her as well by her very hairy forehead.
10:31She has a lot of potential to interact with Mila and she definitely has a lot of energy.
10:37You can see her moving around the most out there on the exhibit.
10:45So today we introduced her to Tembo, the final African elephant in the female group.
10:50They came out, saw each other, went past each other and went on to eat.
10:54So it was a very nice start to an introduction.
10:57For months they have had fence line contact, been able to see each other, touch each other
11:02and interact over a fence line.
11:04This is their first day sharing the same physical space.
11:06So it's a very good step.
11:07It means we've prepared them well and they recognize each other and there's not a real contentious
11:13first meeting.
11:15Mila has really, really come a long way.
11:18From not really knowing what to do with herself when she met the first couple elephants to really
11:23socially becoming more savvy and learning how to work around the exhibit, being braver
11:29when it comes to getting food when it's thrown into the exhibit, especially tree branches, browsed.
11:34She really likes that.
11:36Absolute pleasure to having her heard.
11:38We think she's doing great here at the San Diego Zoo.
11:43Mila is a very smart elephant and she's able to recognize and watch the other elephants and learn.
11:50So you can see her analyzing the scenario and analyzing the situation and looking and watching
11:56all the other elephants and adjusting her behavior based on what they're doing.
12:05So it's been a very long process and a positive process.
12:09We think Mila is doing really well.
12:10We think she's adapted really well here.
12:13She works great with the keepers and she has learned so much from the other elephants.
12:18And they will take care of her for the rest of her natural life, so it couldn't be better.
12:48We think she well.
12:56We're in step two.
12:59We'll take care of her for the rest of the row.
13:01We've got her with the back.
13:02We're in the back of the walk.
13:05We see her all theyrus family members.
13:07We'll take care of her.
13:09We'll take care of her in beauty.
13:10We'll take care of her.
13:11We'll take care of the next dog.
13:12So we'll take care of her too.
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