Elephants Won’t Forget This Friend

HOHENWALD, Tenn. —  Where do elephants go in their old age? A few of them end up in the unlikely surroundings of rural Tennessee, where Carol Buckley is only too happy to lavish love and care on them.

She fell in love with elephants when she was 20, and nearly 25 years later, her passion is undimmed. “Once you meet an elephant, that’s it,” she says.

Three years ago she opened the Elephant Sanctuary to give aging and sick captive elephants a natural setting in which to live out their remaining years.

It’s the only shelter of its kind in the United States.

“Humans have been the reason the elephants have been in the situation they’re in,” Buckley says. “This is exactly what the elephants need.”

In captivity, Buckley says, elephants usually are in chains, which destroy their cartilage and induce arthritis. Food clogs their digestive systems, and boredom can make them neurotic.

At the sanctuary, the animals have healthy food and a fenced-in tract of 112 acres of rolling pasture to roam.

It all began when Buckley was studying exotic animals at Moorpark College and spotted Tarra, a 6-month-old Asian elephant, pacing in the back of a pickup truck.

Tarra was being used to promote a local tire store, and Buckley’s heart ached for her.

Buckley got her father to co-sign a $25,000 loan and bought Tarra and a plot of land in Ojai, where she built a barn for the elephant.

Tarra became a celebrity, appearing in the movie “Annie” and on the TV show “Little House on the Prairie.” Buckley now says she would never allow such exploitation of an elephant, but at the time it seemed the best way to ensure proper care.

When Tarra became too old for show business, Buckley tried some zoos. The elephant seemed unhappy, so in 1990 Buckley took her to a safari park in Cambridge, Ontario.

There Buckley met Scott Blais, who would become her partner at the sanctuary. Blais, now 25, says Buckley’s devotion to elephants immediately was apparent.

“That really caught my eye,” he says. “It allowed me to open up to the elephants a little bit, and I finally learned what elephants are all about and how wonderful they truly are.”

He and Buckley shrugged off the skeptics, pooled their savings and paid $130,000 for the tree-rimmed pasture and small farmhouse in Hohenwald, about 65 miles southwest of Nashville.

“For me, she’s an inspiration,” says Buckley’s friend, Ellen Leach, who works with an animal behavior consulting company in Seattle. “To take this leap in caring for elephants . . . the potential for financial burden is huge.”

The donor-supported sanctuary costs $200,000 a year to run, and Blais and Buckley worked for free when it opened. To Buckley, money comes second to the comfort for elephants.

“Her whole goal and focus in life is to help elephants,” says Kathi Murray, a friend who works at a Georgia wildlife park.

Blais and Buckley have built two heated barns that shield the elephants in winter and serve to quarantine new arrivals being checked for disease.

Buckley wishes she could take every elephant, but can accept only the sickest. Tarra has been joined by Barbara and Jenny.

Barbara arrived in 1996 after a life in captivity, mainly in circuses, and was malnourished and 2,000 pounds underweight. She has since regained most of that weight.

Jenny was rescued from an animal shelter outside Las Vegas where she was dumped because she was too crippled and emaciated to perform.

A fourth elephant could arrive by the end of the year. Eventually, Buckley and Blais hope to have 12 Asian elephants.

As she does her daily chores, Buckley stands on her toes to hug and kiss the elephants. She rubs Tarra’s stomach, eliciting happy purrs. “Oh, I hear your motor’s going,” she exclaims.

Has she missed out by devoting herself to elephants? “I’m directly on my path for what I was intended to do with my life,” she replies.

She and Blais say they have been contacted by a group interested in opening a 5,000-acre sanctuary for African elephants elsewhere in the United States.

Although Buckley doesn’t seek publicity, it has found her and Blais. Time for Kids magazine listed them among their 10 “Heroes for the Planet.” They also have been featured in People magazine and on several network television programs.

“We’ve set the example,” Buckley says. “It takes two people who will dedicate their lives to it and believe in it. . . . I’m no different from you. I just said, ‘Hey, I’m going to do this.”’