Readers will necessarily wonder about the relation between the primary output of this book - the Thai language edition - and the English edition. The English is in effect a mirror translation of the Thai because through many drafts the two language versions have fused with different languages alternating the lead through different passages and subjects. The mirror translation was mandatory because since its inception the English edition of this manual was required to serve as a potential model for other country-specific manuals in the region. The second reason for a complete correspondance was that once asides and elaborate explanations are allowed, a flood is likely to follow, leading to an entirely different book. International readers deserve to know exactly what information is being imparted to the Thai reader.
The target audience
The target reader of this manual is the average Thai mahout. He is a fascinating character which the authors, with over 50 years of "bush time" between them, know well. These men have many wonderful qualities but an affinity for abstract learning is usually not one of them. Nearly all Thai mahouts, probably a higher percentage than in most regional neighbors, are able to read and write, at least to the level of four years of formal education and in terms of general vocabulary probably higher than that. (Thailand has a very long history of male literacy, as in the old days boys learned to read at temples in order to study Buddhism.) Unfortunately, the mahouts' comprehension of modern science and biology is extremely rudimentary. Most will have had no formal instruction whatsoever and almost certainly none beyond fourth grade level.
Consequently, an editorial decision was made to keep the vocabulary and the science very simple; even the use of words and phrases such as "anaerobic", "incubation period", "virus", etc., were considered very carefully, in some cases rejected and in some cases used only if they could be made succinctly understandable in text. We feared that mahouts might reject this manual entirely if confronted with too much material beyond their comprehension. (Another argument for scientific simplicity is that many of these men retain a very Thai, animistic cosmology which precludes any possibility of viewing the world solely in a rationalistic, western way.) Having pointed out the mahouts' limitations, we must also stress that we strongly feel that many mahouts are naturally very bright and capable of more complex procedures than those presented herein. We felt, however, that instructions for more advanced methods should come from veterinarians in the field. Five minutes of interactive, vocal instruction by a good veterinarian on an actual case are worth far more than several pages in this book.
Over the past ten years veterinary care for elephants in Thailand has improved astronomically to become excellent, both in quality and availability. Thailand's "old hand" veterinarians have joined with universities, NGOs, and government agencies (particularly FIO and the Livestock Department) to build a solid cadre of good "elephant vets." As for availability, public donations and government funding have ensured that most Thai elephants, and certainly all complex or critical cases, are treated for free. Thailand's ubiquitous and inexpensive cellular phone network means that veterinarians are now easily contacted, and the excellent road network makes travel easy in most cases. In short, probably over 90 per cent of Thai elephants are within an hour or two's drive of a good "elephant vet."
The level of care presented in this book
This manual will be of some use to veterinary students and even to veterinarians with no elephant experience, but there is nothing new and startling for the experienced elephant veterinarian. As for generalist veterinarians, the very few parts of the main text directed to them are a few tips where treating elephants differs from other animals.
The aim of this book has been to enable mahouts to better support the work of veterinarians, not to do the veterinarian's job. The three primary goals are to help mahouts come to quicker diagnoses, to better communicate symptoms to veterinarians over the phone, and to improve care in follow up. An underlying goal has been to encourage prevention of diseases and conditions occurring through paying more attention to food, appropriate work, and hygiene.
The danger for experts writing an elementary book in their specialty is to get bored with simple presentation and to succumb to the temptation to include overly sophisticated content, thus alienating the original target audience. During the writing of this book much overly technical material was discarded, for example, how to differentiate a cyst from a haematoma, complex diagnostic charts, formulae for determining weights through elaborate measurements of the elephant's body, etc.
Veterinarian readers are asked to suspend judgment on some care techniques presented which are contrary to modern Western professional norms. Veterinarians will wonder, for example, why there is no recommendation for tetanus vaccinations, why the use of cotton wool is so promoted, why the manual in extreme cases recommends cauterizing wounds, and why the use of hydrogen peroxide is suggested. Local conditions mean there are very good reasons for such seeming errors or outdated practice.
Camp managers
Besides mahouts, the second important audience for this book is camp managers, including elephant owners who run their own camps. Some camp managers are quite knowledgeable about elephants while others are simply administrators who act no differently than if they were managing a fleet of cars or trucks. Given the managers' control over food, budgets, hiring and firing of mahouts, determining work assignments and schedules, etc., camp managers often have more influence over elephants' health, for better or for worse, than do the mahouts themselves. The section on "Food", for example, was written primarily with camp managers in mind. The section on equipment and techniques used to control elephants was written largely as background for inexperienced managers. (Neophyte mahouts will, after all, get most of their instruction on equipment orally from older mahouts.)
The inclusion of camp managers has also hopefully opened the door sufficiently that the book will be useful to other people working for the welfare of elephants: government officials, NGO staff, scientists, etc.
Editor's notes
If the English text does not occasionally seem awkward, this book is not doing its job, simply because there is no natural audience for which this book would ever have been written in English. The information and language is far too basic for veterinarians, veterinary technicians, or even for readers with a secondary education. Further, the Thai language sometimes takes a conversational tone which would be inappropriate in English.
Every effort has been made to keep the two languages in parallel. There has been no slavish devotion to internal sentence order (indeed, that would be counterproductive), but from sentence level upwards the two languages mirror each other. Layout follows the same principle; the same page numbers apply in each edition. This synchronization has been for two reasons. First, it should help readers who wish to work in both languages, primarily Thais trying to improve their technical vocabulary in English but also to support foreign veterinarians, conservationists, and scientists who read some Thai or are working in Thailand. Second, the parallel structure will keep readers reminded that what they are reading was not written with them as the primary recipient.
Many readers of the English edition, particularly hands-on keepers and veterinarians, will acutely feel a paucity of information on traditional technique, such as training and herbal medicines. For four compelling reasons, much traditional knowledge has been kept to a minimum. First, mahouts can best learn such techniques not from a few lines in books but rather from long hours of actually doing the job alongside older mahouts. Second, in Thailand customary technique varies greatly both between regions and the ethnicity (or culture) of the keepers. Third, traditional technique is often so complex that an adequate book would be larger than the one you hold in your hands. Fourth, traditional technique is often impracticable in modern times. This care manual was written to convey modern thinking to mahouts, not to document old Asian ways for academics and professionals
The Thai language
The Thai language used is a careful mix of the formal and the colloquial. As with many Asian languages, the written word requires a degree of formality and if this courtesy were not extended to mahouts, they might feel patronized. Every effort has been made, however, to avoid technical terms and to use the simplest word which is sufficiently clear, for example "throat" rather than "esophagus" or "in heat" rather than the more accurate "in oestrus." Nearly always the word employed is the word that would be used in everyday speech.
Each language has its shortcomings. Thai, for example, has no short, single, everyday word for "sterile", forcing the use of "clean" (sa-ard); in daily life this is no disadvantage because context virtually always clarifies that "sterile" is meant - but the lack does pose problems in translation. English, conversely, lacks certain concise words which are commonplace in Thai; for example, the everyday mahouts' vocabulary has a lovely word for "perineum" (fii yeb or "sewed seam") and every Thai person understands "dyspepsia" (thong eut).
The English language
For some words and phrases, anomalies have been allowed - indeed unavoidable. When listing indications for diseases, for example, the Thai word akarn means "conditions" or "signs". Neither of these words are perfectly apt in English, however, and because "symptoms" is a bit too specific, the somewhat awkward technical term "clinical signs" has been used because it perfectly captures the Thai meaning.
The extremely basic level of the Thai has meant that some sweeping generalities and oversimplifications have necessarily carried over into the English, for example, "natural food" or "untreated soil. "The meaning is abundantly clear at the level of the Thai target reader and it is hoped that readers in English will make the mental leap and not castigate the authors for their perceived ignorance. Because they reflect the circumstances and the Thai language so perfectly, some words are freely employed which would never be used in scientific or technical writing: "aggressive", "naughty", "nasty sores", etc.
A similar divergence from accepted scientific writing is the extensive use of feet and inches instead relying solely on the metric system. This deviation is because, perhaps surprisingly, "feet" (fut) and "inches" (niw) are the units used in the Thai text because those words would be used by the mahouts in speech. Any spoken approximation of an elephant's height will be in feet, and chains are sized by the hun, which is 1/8". Even pieces of cloth and such are usually described in feet. One reason for the use of "feet" might be that in the old days elephants were sold, because of influence from Burma (now Myanmar), "by the foot" (khaai pen fut) of height. Another reason might be that feet and inches are more 'organic' units than metres and centimetres in describing an elephant's dimensions.
In a few instances, brief additions have been made in English within brackets. Usually these are more precise technical terms, e.g., "heat [oestrus]" or Thai concepts, objects, brand names, etc., which have no counterpart in English.
Dr Preecha Phuangkum
Richard C. Lair
Dr Taweepoke
Angkwanith
