Mae Boutong the Asian Elephant, Chiang Mai

Today me and Isabella took a trip to visit Patara Elephant Farm. At Patara they rescue elephants from unsuitable living conditions and owners who mistreat them, and bring them back to full health. The local farmers grow crops and food, which is bought by Patara Farm using the money from tourists and is then fed to the elephants... they eat 10% of their body weight every day!

The program we took was called 'An Elephant Owner For They Day' where you learn everything about looking after an elephant. We learnt how to tell an elephants mood, learnt to wash and clean them and to feed them.

First of all we were given traditional clothing made by the wives and daughters of the farmers, so that all visitors approaching the elephants are always wearing the same clothing. At this point we were introduced to our elephants trainer Sawas and our elephant  for the day Mae Boutong. She was a 28 year old female asian elephant and 3 months pregnant! To make sure we would get on OK with Mae Boutong and that she would like us we had to go and feed her and se if she would accept taking food from us, which she did no problem. I was pretty nervous at first putting my hands near an elephants mouth, but you get used to it quite quickly and soon enough our hands were covered with elephant slobber!