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THE ELEPHANT JUNGLE SANCTUARY & WHY YOU SHOULDN’T SUPPORT RIDING ELEPHANTS
If you’re thinking of honeymooning in Thailand then I would highly recommend a trip to Chiang Mai to be with the elephants at The Elephant Jungle Sanctuary. This sanctuary is an ethical and sustainable eco-tourism project in Thailand, with their concern about the welfare of elephants it became their mission to provide the elephants with good health, freedom and happiness that they truly deserve! I visited this place last month and I can’t even tell you what an incredible experience it was!
ABOUT THE SANCTUARY
I know that when many people think of Thailand they envision riding elephants, PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS. I am going to talk more about how goddam awful this is later on the post and why us tourists shouldn’t be supporting it but for now let’s talk about our experience with The Elephant Jungle Sanctuary. They maintain a strict no riding policy and they hope that their approach will set an example which will in time lead to a transformation in elephant tourism as well as human and ethical treatment to elephants worldwide.
Their hope is to lead by example and contribute to a positive change in the perception of elephants, to witness a future where elephants are not rigged, poached, over worked or abused and are instead treated with care, love and respect. The sanctuaries are home to over sixty formerly mistreated elephants who are now free to enjoy their lives and we got to spend an entire day with them!
Our day started by changing into traditional Karen clothes then learning all about the elephants. For example they only sleep for 3 hours a day! SAY WHAT! Which means they have staff with them 24 hours a day taking care of them. We also learnt that Elephants eat a huge amount of food, needing to consume an average of 150kg of food each day just to survive! Larger elephants will eat much more, with some known to eat up to 300kg/day. They also need to drink a great deal of water, with some estimating that each elephant must drink 150L per day. (I struggle to drink 1 litre of water a day!)
Once we had learnt about the elephants it was time to meet and feed them! We were each giving two bunches of bananas to feed them, one banana at a time. We interacted with them, played with them and felt their skin, it was honestly the most incredible experience to see an elephant this close up! Turns out this part of the day was just their appetiser because after that we carried these huge leaves down to them and they tucked straight in!
After this, we enjoyed a traditional Thai lunch with fresh fruit. Then we walked with the elephants down to a muddy reserve where we gave them a mud bath (and got pretty covered in mud ourselves!) Then we walked with them over to the river where we bathed and brushed them. It was absolutely beautiful! I honestly cannot recommend this experience enough and it’s great to know that you’re contributing to the welfare of the elephants by visiting!
*Please be aware of less than ethical imitations of this company operating under similar names in an effort to attract customers using their caring reputation that do not maintain the same standard or respectful treatment towards their animals. If booking ensure you are booking directing to the official “Elephant Jungle Sanctuary” so that you are supporting the positive change
MISTREATMENT OF ELEPHANTS IN THAILAND
Nowadays, elephants primarily work in the tourism and entertainment sectors. Unfortunately, very few companies treat their elephants ethically, or with the respect they deserve, instead viewing them simply as a profitable business asset. Young elephants are sometimes poached from the wild to be sold and used as novelties in hotels, or trained to perform for tourists. This practice is incredibly damaging to the population of Thai elephants, as the mother (and sometimes other females, such as the chosen ‘foster mother’) is often killed during the poaching process, and this separation greatly endangers the life and long-term health of the infant. Some estimate that as many as 70% of baby elephants currently used in tourism may have been poached from their natural habitat.
Work includes tourist ridding, logging, and circus activities.
Sometimes they are made to carry people for up to 5 hours. Being forced to work in busy Thailand, slowly wears the elephants down as elephants need to cool down and be allowed to eat more then they are provided. They are hurt at these camps guides use hooks to force them to carry tourists which they hit the elephants with, causing bleeding.
WHY NOT TO RIDE AN ELEPHANT
Elephants are not designed to carry weight on their back. They have evolved to support a mass amount of weight suspended below their spine. Elephants spines are not like horses for instance. In order for an elephant to be ridden, it needs to be put through a ritual called Phajaan. The word “phajaan” is a ritual that is practiced in Thailand by tribes and has been around for hundreds of years. It can best be described as “Crushing” an elephants spirit. I’m not going to go into too much detail here because it’s absolutely heart breaking and frankly unbelievable that this type of torture is happening but you can read a bit more about it here. Once the tribe feel the baby elephant has had its ‘spirit broken’, it will have nothing left to do but submit, listen and learn what the masters are trying to teach it. It’s absolutely outrageous and all the for enjoyment of tourists.
WHAT ARE THE ELEPHANT JUNGLE SANCTUARY DOING TO HELP?
At the Jungle Sanctuary they are giving the elephants a place to live free from danger or harm. They keep their elephants together as a family and they don’t torture their elephants in order to train them because to them, elephants are part of the family, they do not allow any tourist to ride them.
They want people to realise that these lovely creatures should be treated with love and care instead of abusing them.
THE CHOICE IS UP TO PEOPLE
It is our demand for elephant rides that leads to more baby elephants getting captured from their mothers, tortured and sold off to entertain us. If people stop visiting these cruel places then the demand will no longer be there for these places to continue trading.
HOW CAN YOU HELP?
- You can help by visiting or volunteering at The Elephant Jungle Sanctuary – The money they get from people visiting and volunteering is used to keep the elephants happy and living a lifestyle without harm.
- Help them by spreading the message of elephant treatment in Thailand and why you should never ride an elephant. You can find them on Facebook here and instagram here.
- Or donate towards one of their causes – Donations will go towards adopting more elephants, elephant daily needs, elephant rescue, food, veterinary care, infrastructure and land so they can constantly be growing and expanding the capacity of their Sanctuary and receiving more elephants.
If you’d like to book to visit the sanctuary then you can do so here! I just wanted to take the time to thank you for reading all of the way down too, I know it’s a long post but the safety and welfare of these animals is so important! Please spread the word about not riding elephants xxx
Truly amazing animals!! Great photos
Hello
I came across your wonderful write up today about elephant santuaries in Thailand and why you shouldn’t ride elephants. I am travelling to Thailand soon and it is a dream of mine to visit an ETHICAL elephant sanctuary. In my research into finding one I have come across these posts and reflections of the ELEPHANT JUNGLE SANCTUARY COMPANY. Whilst I have read great things about the C/Mai branch, the Phuket one doesn’t seem to follow suit.
Please, I implore you to take some time to look into this and decide for yourself, perhaps you might consider making an edit or side note to this post reflecting these findings so that your followers and future readers of this post might be aware to not support the disguised abuse of these “sanctuaries”.
Please understand, I do not wish to detract from the beautiful experience that you had, I merely wish to help people achieve what they are trying to when they give their money to a sanctuary in support of freeing these gentle giants from their suffering and cruelty. As a huge animal lover, I know how important that can be and I’m sure so many others would see their money actually going towards the true, good and ethical cause as opposed to what has sadly become a tourist scamming fraud of a company. I feel it is important to recognise that in supporting the Chiang Mai ELEPHANT JUNGLE SANCTUARY well-intentioned tourists are supporting the entire company and, in turn, providing funding to the Phuket branch, allowing them to continue their abusive treatment of these animals.
I have added some links below if you might consider them.
I would love to hear back from you.
Thank you so much for your time.
Jodi
https://www.vegantravel.com/elephant-jungle-sanctuary-ethical/
https://mashable.com/2016/05/24/elephant-tourism/#K93vWfMft5qd
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g297930-d11666462-r505409072-Elephant_Jungle_Sanctuary_Phuket-Patong_Kathu_Phuket.html
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g297930-d11666462-r575588868-Elephant_Jungle_Sanctuary_Phuket-Patong_Kathu_Phuket.html (TICK THE “POOR” AND “TERRIBLE” BOXES UNDER THE REVIEW OPTIONS AND HAVE A READ OF SOME OF THE OTHER ‘CRUELTY’ RELATED REVIEWS AND POSTS)