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Jumbo

What a sad but fascinating story David Attenborough told us tonight.  Jumbo was a young African elephant brought to England in the mid 1880's.  He was taken to London zoo.  He had a devoted keeper but had a very bad diet and was used to give rides to several people at once. He also did not have the company of any other elephants which must have been very lonely for him. Attenborough tracked down his skeleton in New York and listened to the findings of scientists who pointed out the tale tell signs in his bones.  Also there were stories of the time of Jumbos rage at night and this seems to have been due to toothache, too many sticky buns and not enough fibre.  The people then , including Barnum the circus owner, were not as aware as we are of the needs of elephants, but we have no excuse, elephants need to be kept in their country of origin where they can live out their lives in the company of their own families.When we have a world where people exploit people it is not surprizing that they exploit animals.

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