Elephants remember. But what do they learn from conflict with humans?
Elephants remember. But what do they learn from conflict with humans?
Aniruddha Dhamorikar, Khanin Changmai, Down to Earth
April 1, 2025
See link
https://www.downtoearth.org.in/wildlife-biodiversity/elephants-remember-but-what-do-they-learn-from-conflict-with-humans
for photo and graphics.
For decades, human-elephant conflict in India has been measured in death
tolls. But beyond the grim statistics of elephants poisoned and humans
trampled lies a broader, often overlooked question: How do repeated clashes
with humans shape the behaviour, health and survival of elephants in the
long run?
In 2001, seventeen elephant deaths were reported in Assam’s Sonitpur
district, followed by five more in 2002. Most of the carcasses were found
in and around farmlands. Post-mortem investigations revealed that many of
these deaths were deliberate poisonings. This tragedy was believed to have
resulted from elephants damaging standing crops, intensifying
human-elephant interactions.
According to government records, 36 elephants died over the two years.
During the same period, 31 people in Sonitpur also lost their lives due to
direct encounters with elephants — while defending crops and property or
encountering them unexpectedly.
In 2024, the sudden deaths of eleven elephants from a herd of thirteen in
Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh, revived memories of mass
retaliatory killings. Since the elephants were found near farmlands,
deliberate poisoning was initially suspected. The elephants had fed on kodo
millet and exhibited symptoms typically associated with poisoning. However,
post-mortem results pointed to a natural cause — poisoning by mycotoxins
produced by fungi infecting the crops.
While the Sonitpur incident is regarded as a clear case of retaliation,
foul play was ruled out in Bandhavgarh. However, beyond the loss of an
entire family — spanning at least three generations — there is little
understanding of the broader impact of such sudden, large-scale deaths. We
have no records of elephants surviving poisoning attempts or recovering
from exposure. While efforts were made to revive ailing elephants in
Bandhavgarh, only an adult bull and a calf survived without assistance.
Most human-elephant conflict statistics focus on fatalities. While it is
known that around 5 per cent of elephant deaths reported between 2014 and
2023 resulted from deliberate poisoning, incidents causing injury,
permanent impairment or the orphaning of calves are rarely documented. This
leaves a significant proportion of the data missing. In this article, we
explore the impact of negative human interactions on elephant health.
As sentient beings with close-knit family structures and lifespans
comparable to humans, elephants suffer the consequences of human conflict
in ways that extend beyond death. In the Bandhavgarh case, although the
deaths were not classified as conflict-related, the fact that it takes high
quantities of mycotoxins to result in such deaths has been overlooked.
One possible explanation is that elephants, frequently chased away from
farmlands, have adapted to forage opportunistically, consuming large
quantities in short periods before being driven off, according to experts.
It is speculated that while there was no deliberate poisoning, the deaths
were ultimately a consequence of ongoing human-elephant conflict.
The health effects of such conflicts, often chronic in nature, span a wide
spectrum — from social and psychological well-being to physical injuries
and disease. The impact on social health, particularly the well-being of
elephants as part of a herd or community, remains one of the least explored
areas.
A behavioural study conducted in Tamil Nadu in the late 1980s found that
adult and subadult male elephants took greater risks than female-led herds
to forage on crops believed to be more nutritious than wild vegetation.
Such risk-taking behaviour increases their chances of encountering
deterrent measures, including extreme actions that may lead to deaths.
Across India’s elephant-ranging regions, there is a marked increase in
human and elephant fatalities during the crop-ripening and harvest season
from October to December. During this time, conflicts often escalate into
violence, with elephants being forced into rivers, speared with flaming
weapons, or even baited with crude pressure bombs.
While these confrontations occasionally make headlines, the seasonal,
isolated nature of such reports limits our understanding of their long-term
effects on elephant mental and physical health. How elephants learn to
navigate these violent encounters cannot be deduced from reports of
elephant deaths.
Every year, around October, mixed-family herds — often with newborn calves
— descend on farmlands to feed on crops such as paddy and sugarcane. While
the older elephants recognise the high risks, the young calves learn about
these dangers from an early age. The long-term impact of these antagonistic
encounters on their physical development and social behaviour remains
poorly understood.
Orphaning is commonly reported, as calves are often unable to keep up with
adult elephants when fleeing from human settlements. Retaliatory measures
such as electrocution and poisoning frequently result in the deaths of
adult females, leaving calves stranded. The Bandhavgarh incident left one
calf orphaned, wandering for days before it was rescued and efforts were
made to integrate it into another herd. In Sonitpur, attempts to reunite an
orphaned calf with its herd failed for a long time.
Reuniting orphaned calves with their herds is unpredictable, as it depends
on at least one or two lactating females accepting the calf. While some
successful reunions have been recorded, failed attempts leave calves in the
care of state forest departments, where they are raised by captive
elephants and trained for domestic use. The long-term consequences of
growing up amid constant conflict remain unclear — whether this will lead
to calves growing up with less tolerance towards humans than their older
relatives or shier of humans remains to be observed.
Physical injuries sustained through human-elephant conflicts are common but
rarely reported. In 2018, a herd of 10 elephants wreaked havoc in villages
in Madhya Pradesh’s Anuppur district. Having been chased across the border
from Chhattisgarh, the elephants bore open wounds. When captured, one was
found suffering from sepsis, which would have been fatal without timely
treatment. While two elephants died, it remains unclear whether their
deaths were due to injuries sustained in conflict or natural causes.
Elephants that raid farmlands often carry visible scars — large lumps on
their sides and backs, telltale signs of past gun pellet wounds from
attempts to drive them away from human settlements. While these injuries
may not be fatal, they can lead to infections and behavioural changes, such
as increased aggression. It is believed that the 2018 incident, in which a
herd rampaged through a village and killed a person, was the result of
prolonged chasing and shooting.
As conflicts persist, it becomes increasingly important to examine the
lasting effects of such encounters on elephant health and social structures.
Aniruddha Dhamorikar works as Lead for Species Conservation for WWF-India's
Brahmaputra Landscape based out of Tezpur and Khanin Changmai works as
Associate Coordinator - Animal Health with WWF-India based out of Assam.