Watch: Heartbreaking scenes show young elephants being captured for commercial purposes
It’s legal but it’s secretive, and this video shows why.
Although capturing wild elephants is legal in Zimbabwe, footage has emerged to show it’s practised in gruesome ways. The video (above) catches teams of men in the act, apparently with the intention of selling the animals to zoos in China. During the operation, 14 elephants were caught by workers at Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, reports The Guardian.
In Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe, young wild elephants were hunted down by shooting tranquiliser guns from a helicopter. When they swooped in with the chopper, the rest of the herd ran away, leaving the calf fully vulnerable. The team then bound the sedated baby elephant and dragged it into a confined pen inside a truck.
Over the past 20 years, more than 1,000 wild elephants from Africa and Asia have been captured and sold to zoos around the world. The elephants are often captured while young.
