Richard M. Laws Elephant Data Sheets and Notebooks

The Richard M. Laws Elephant Data Sheets and Notebooks (an accretion of the Ian Parker Collection Relating to East African Wildlife Conservation) include Laws’ field research records, notes, tables, and analysis of several thousand wild elephants culled from herds in the national parks and reserves of Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania during the final years of British colonial administration in East Africa. The original data sheets are filled to varying extents with manuscript inscriptions on duplicated forms. These data records largely duplicate those donated by Ian Parker, while Laws’ notes, tables, and analysis are unique to this collection.

As noted in the finding aid for Ian Parker’s papers, “Field data compiled during culling (herd thinning) operations intended to mitigate elephant overpopulation in 1965-1969 at environmentally stressed sites: Murchison Falls (now Kabalega National Park), Budongo Central Forest Reserve (C.F.R.), Tsavo, and Mkomasi. Taking advantage of this unique opportunity, body and organ measurements, age estimates, reproductive status, and disease observations were collected postmortem and recorded on 3,175 data sheets. The data sheets are unique because the sampling represents natural (albeit environmentally stressed) family groups rather than trophies or weak individuals, and this first cull of so many individuals will likely never be reproduced.”

Maintaining both Parker’s and Laws’ near-duplicate sets of records allows researchers to compare, confirm, or interpret and correct the available spreadsheet of transcribed data (download available at Parker McCullagh 2021) in cases where, for example, units were not explicitly recorded or impermanent ink records are now illegible. The forms prompt recording up to 133 data points, with spaces for samples collected, and allow space for notes (see Parker McCullagh 2021:15-21). This unpublished manuscript explains that, in the field, researchers found such consistent results for some data measures that they discontinued collecting certain fields over time, allowing a focus on more sample collections, e.g. blood serum for later analysis.

The project was a collaboration between Parker and Laws, Director of the Ford Foundation funded Tsavo Research Project from 1967 to March 1968, when he resigned (see Laws 2012: 177, 240). While data records form the largest part of Laws’ papers, they are complemented by tables and notes interspersed among the records as well as hardcover notebooks and the contents of soft folders including manuscript notes, data summary tables, and SPSS mainframe computer analysis. These focus primarily on his records and analysis of elephant reproductive biology. We retain both sets of record sheets to support interpretation of missing, illegible, or obscured data in one or the other set. The sheets first donated by Parker were digitized in 2012 and are available in UF Digital Collections as the “Ian Parker Collection of East African Wildlife Conservation: Elephant data sheets” (see: https://ufdc.ufl.edu/AA00013409). Parker’s original manuscript sheets are housed in storage, where Laws’ sheets will also be maintained.

Abbreviations/Codes for Referencing Parks/Park Areas

Murchison Falls National Park, North and South (MFP, MFPN, MFPS)

Tsavo (TSO)

Mkomasi, Mkomasi East, Mkomasi Central (MKO, MKE, MKC)

Budongo Central Forest Reserve (Budongo C.F.R.),

Also/other:

Wildlife Services Ltd. (WLS)

Game Management Uganda (GMU)