The Houston Zoo welcomes baby elephant Kirby

The Houston Zoo is going to need a really big rattle for its newest addition. On Friday, November 15, at 3 p.m., the zoo’s lovely Asian elephant matriarch, Shanti, 34, gave birth to a baby girl named Kirby. This is Shanti’s seventh baby with her long-time pachyderm boyfriend, Thailand, 58.

Kirby weighed 314 pounds at birth, significantly smaller than her older sibling Nelson, born in 2020, and slightly larger than her big sister Joy, born in 2017. Shanti’s pregnancy lasted 21 months, a usual length for Asian elephants, but still the second one longest gestation in the mammalian class after their African cousins.

Within six minutes Kirby was on her feet and within half an hour she was walking. The birth took place in the cowshed at the McNair Asian Elephant Habitat, where Shanti and Kirby will spend a few more days before being shown to the public.

The Houston Zoo’s elephant breeding program has been an integral part of expanding Borneo’s elephant population since its launch in 2007. Parts of the entrance fees go towards the work of Dr. Nurzhafarina “Farina” Othman, who specializes in local education and activism in Borneo Elephants are known to decimate crops, leading to conflict. Othman’s work has helped landowners in Borneo find solutions to keep the elephant population thriving. The zoo’s support was partly responsible for the doubling of the Bornean population in 2018.

Elephants have been a part of the Houston Zoo since its inception. In 2017, the zoo opened the McNair Asian Elephant Habitat, a massive new enclosure with walkways for visitors and pools for the elephants to frolic and escape the Texas heat. The exhibit includes everything from fountains to a special puzzle tree that elephants can blow into for treats.

The zoo was also a leader in veterinary medicine. In June, 40-year-old Asian elephant Tess received the first mRNA vaccine against elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus (EEHV) 1A. Baylor College of Medicine pioneered the fight against a particularly deadly elephant disease. All in all, it’s been a big year for the zoo’s biggest residents.