Hauling a tusk in November—it is as heavy as it looks!
If you read only one of my blogs, ever, please read this one. It is the founding principle behind Preservation Mammoth.
As you can tell, I love mammoth tusks. I love their grandeur! I love the immense size and elegant double curve of a mammoth tusk. I love the beauty of the ivory with its rough, stained outer texture and the creamy inside with its carbon fiber-like cross hatching and rich colors.
Left: This mobious clearly shows the carbon fiber-like Schrager lines and creamy tan color of mammoth tusk.
Right: This female figure highlights rich color staining from ground minerals and the sharp, angled Schrager lines of mammoth ivory.
And I love the stories they tell of their Pleistocene past, of their cold storage in the frozen soils of the north, and of the gold miners who unearth and care for them. I especially love, of course, how the ivory is brought back to life by artists and conservators.
Mammoth tusks have survived impossible odds but lately face a new threat—under threat by an absolute ban that intends to protect elephants but is so extreme it is detrimental to its own cause, and it threatens to destroy what remains of mammoths. Most of us know elephants in Africa are in trouble. Elephants have been brutally slaughtered in East Africa and the habitat of all elephants has been reduce by 42% in the last 20 years. The value of their tusks in Asia is driving the slaughter, most insidiously by militant groups who use the money to buy weapons. It's brutal and greedy, the elephants suffer horribly, and efforts are under way to see that it stops. A "Total Ivory Ban" which makes all ivory illegal and mandates that all ivory items be destroyed is being proposed as a way to protect East African Elephants, and I largely agree with it. We should do what we can to protect elephants but banning antiquities, ancient mammoth tusk, and other fossil ivories does nothing to protect elephants.
I find it shameful that ancient mammoth tusks dug up as a by-product by gold miners have been lumped into the same category as blood ivory from elephants. Mammoth and Elephant ivory is clearly and distinctly different from each other (details in a later blog), although small pieces are not always so obvious. Sure, it's simple to blanket ban everything ivory but that perpetuates ignorance, throwing the proverbial baby out with the bath water. The absolute ban dooms surviving mammoth remains to rot where they lie, allowing their stories to rot with them. It ignores the lessons of the mammoth that life is fragile and ignores what happens when climates change.
I believe that honoring and using the remains of long extinct mammoths celebrates their stories and educates us on the value of our living elephants and highlights how precious and fragile life can be. Therefore I believe mammoth remains must be used, preserved, and honored, and elephants must be protected and that the survival of each go hand in hand. Education over ignorance!
An African elephant with pink stained tusks. Image taken from the web.
There are many things being done to protect elephants, including armed guards, staining the tusks pink which renders them worthless, removing the tusks before poachers get to them, and strengthening elephant ivory bans worldwide. Last July (2016) Obama passed a toughened ban that severely limits the trade of products containing elephant ivory but excludes fossil ivories like mammoth and walrus, and certain antiques. This is a great forward step. Even the Chinese government has proposed to make the trade in elephant ivory illegal by the end of 2017, a great bit of progress, if it happens. All of these efforts are excellent and have their place. The proposed "Total Ivory Ban" (Absolute Ivory Ban) is extreme in it's scope and detrimental to its own cause.
Making all ivory illegal and subject to destruction would include my ancient mammoth tusks and fossil walrus tusks that are dug up from the frozen ground. This Absolute Ivory Ban (Total Ivory Ban) proposes to make everything ivory illegal and that all ivory items should be destroyed. Antique sculptures and carvings, even century old instruments like pianos, violin bows, bagpipes, and antique guitars that have ivory parts must be confiscated and destroyed under this ban. This absolute ban and destruction of all ivory and antiquities smacks of Taliban style extremism and the destruction of ancient temples and sculpture. It smacks of Prohibition, and will not help the cause. Absolutism, extremism, is not the path to educating people and is not the path to protecting elephants.
Mammoth ivory that rotted in the field.
Mammoth ivory will rot in the gold fields where its found if it cannot be sold. Miners will protect and preserve tusks when they find them but if there is no market for the tusks they will be left out to rot. This would be an unfortunate end to 35,000 years of survival.
A male mammoth tusk tip lovingly brought back to life.
Let's continue doing our part to see the protection and survival of elephants and other threatened animals of East Africa. And let's continue to do our part to preserve what remains of our extinct mammoths.
Education over ignorance!
Preservation Mammoth.