Wildlife tourism may negatively affect elephant behaviour

Increasing numbers of tourists may be a stressor for free-ranging elephants, and may have potentially negative effects on animal welfare, a study has found.

People are increasingly interested in observing wildlife such as African elephants, but the study published in the Journal of Zoology study shows that wildlife tourism may have negative effects.

"Tourists who wish to observe animals in their natural habitat should be aware of their potential negative effects on animal welfare and research should investigate best practise standards to minimise such negative effects," said lead author Isabelle Szott, of Liverpool John Moores University, in the UK.

Over the course of 15 months, researchers recorded the behaviour of elephants in relation to the overall number of tourists in an African reserve.

Elephants were more likely to perform aggressive behaviour towards other elephants when the number of tourists in the reserve was high.

Also, elephant herds were more likely to move away from tourists when multiple vehicles were present.