Summary

Bong Su was an adult Asian Elephant bull. He was born in West Malaysia in 1974 and in 1977 was gifted to Melbourne Zoo by the Sultan of Pahang. He was a much-beloved resident at the zoo until his death in 2017. The Museum's Preparators carried out the painstaking work of preserving and preparing Bong Su's hide for display. The tusks in this mount are replicas but are an exact replica of Bong Su's, look closely and see the details of the growth rings on his left tusk.

Asian Elephants occur in south-east Asia, from western Indonesia and Malaysia to Bangladesh and parts of India. They live in grasslands, shrublands and forests and travel long distances foraging for food and water. Their home ranges are large, often several hundred kilometres square and can cross national boundaries. As they roam across such wide areas, they are important for the long-range dispersal of seeds from the plants they feed on.

Asian Elephants are a social species, living in matrilineal communities made up of adult females and juveniles of both sexes. Males leave once they reach puberty to establish their own home range. Pregnancy lasts from 18 to 22 months with the females usually having one calf every four or five years.

There are thought to be fewer than 50,000 Asian Elephants in the wild and populations are declining. They are therefore considered Endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). They are threatened by destruction of their habitat and by poaching for their ivory. Asian Elephants are also included in Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to ensure that international trade does not threaten their survival in the wild.

In addition to the mount of Bong Su on display in Our Wondrous Planet, the Museums Victoria Research Institute has preserved the skull, skeleton, and frozen tissue of Bong Su. In 2023, the Museums Victoria Research Institute cultured and cryopreserved living skin cells (fibroblasts) from the grandson of Bong Su.

Specimen Details

Taxonomy

Geospatial Information

  • Country

    Malaysia

  • State

    Pahang

  • Latitude

    3.75

  • Longitude

    102.5

  • Geodetic Datum

    WGS84

  • Georeference Source

    Google Earth

  • Georeference Protocol

    Estimation

  • Georeference Date

    2017-10-10T00:00:00

  • Georeference By

    Karen K. Roberts