Abstract:
Doses for standing sedation allowing for various procedures in otherwise inaccessible, untrained captive
African elephant bulls are presented. Thirty-three standing sedations were performed in 12 males aged
8–30 years (one to four sedations per animal). Each bull received a combination of 0.009 ± 0.002 mg/kg
medetomidine and 0.03 ± 0.007 mg/kg butorphanol. Full sedation was reached on average 25.5 min after
injection. The addition of hyaluronidase (1000–2000 IU) significantly reduced time to full sedation to
16.5 min (paired t test, P = 0.024). Reversal was induced with intramuscular atipamezole 0.008 (±0.002)
and naltrexone 0.035 (±0.015) mg/kg. Recovery took on average 7 min (3–18 min). The medetomidine/
butorphanol combination provided safe standing sedation for smaller procedures.
