African elephant 'baby boom' at Cabárceno Park

ELEPHANTS are breeding like rabbits at Cantabria's huge open-air wildlife park – two babies have been born in less than a month out of a total of 19 since the year 1990, something staff say is 'extraordinary, exceptional and very uncommon'.

Cabárceno Park's management is attempting to home-breed all its African elephants so as not to have to import any from Africa itself, where the species is in danger of extinction due to illegal poaching and so-called 'trophy hunting'.

Set in 25 hectares (61.5 acres) of prehistoric steppe-like landscape which appeared following a mining accident that led to an entire mountain range exploding, Cabárceno is said to be 'the envy of the international community' because of its prolific elephant-breeding.

It is one of just 48 wildlife centres in Europe which houses African elephants.

Head vet at Cabárceno, Santiago Borragán, says the ever-increasing extended family at the park is 'becoming a routine thing', although he says in reality it is anything but.

Even more remarkable is the fact that the elephants born this year and expected next year are the grandchildren of some of the originals.

Borragán says the park developed 'pioneering techniques' for monitoring cows' reproductive cycles, testing hormone levels in faeces and urine – something now carried out in wildlife parks all over the world - but says Cabárceno staff have actually stopped testing because they are 'so used to' elephants breeding constantly that they 'know exactly what to look out for at every stage'.

Instead, they only carry out tests to confirm pregnancy.

Where a cow's results appear to show she is not pregnant, another three or four attempts are made to get her in calf and, if they do not work, she undergoes a type of IVF treatment.

“All this means we've reached such levels of reproduction efficiency that practically all our cows are going to give us babies. And I don't mean one or two cows – I'm talking about 10 or 11,” Borragán reveals.

Cabárceno Park's layout is one of the elements that makes the breeding environment ideal for all types of wild animals, not just elephants – they all have huge, open-air, unfenced fields to roam in, exactly as they would in their natural habitats, meaning their physical and psychological wellbeing is assured, something that is not the case when they are kept in cages in zoos.

Despite having only four bulls, of whom only two are currently covering, a third learning to do so and a fourth as yet too young, Cabárceno has the largest number of African elephants on the planet outside of Africa itself.

And if its track record continues as the species continues to face extinction in the wild, it is possible that one day, Cabárceno Park may have more elephants than Africa.

As yet, though, it is too early to start speculating that their name may be changed to Spanish elephants, or Cantabrian elephants.

One of the young males will be moved to another park in Europe in two years' time, however, so as not to generate too much aggressive competition between bulls.

The breeding programme does not always go entirely to plan: for example, the latest baby, a female (pictured) is having to be bottle-fed as her mother rejected her.

Borragán says this is partly because the mother is young and this is her first child, whom she gave birth to alone out in the open, and possibly feeling 'stressed out' because of other elephants around her.

Only four babies in 27 years have been rejected by their mothers and had to be bottle-fed, though, and have all been for 'understandable reasons' which staff monitor closely to attempt to prevent its recurrence.