Installation of 100 life-sized elephants gives perspective on conservation: Experts

A traveling installation of 100 life-sized elephants will be unveiled in New York City on Friday, offering perspective on just how big the land-roaming giants are and how much space they need to thrive, experts say.

Elephants are increasingly losing their habitat, often due to human encroachment and development, researchers told ABC News. While it may be common in Asian countries for elephants to roam in people's backyards, an encounter with a wild elephant is rare for residents of Western countries, Shermin de Silva, an assistant professor of ecology at the University of California, San Diego, and founder of elephant conservation nonprofit Trunks & Leaves.

"I think it's hard for a lot of people ... especially in the U.S., to picture just how much space they take up, how much space they need," she said. "Imagine if you had an elephant in your backyard. That's a very tall order, and that's the kind of challenge that we're dealing with."

It's "well-documented" that elephant populations -- both the Asian and African populations -- have been in steady decline, Patrick Roehrdanz, director for Climate Change and Biodiversity Conservation International, an environmental nonprofit, told ABC News. Elephants have been known to traverse hundreds of miles in search of food and water and can live in diverse ecosystems -- anything from a dry savannah to a lush rainforest, De Silva said.

Habitats for Asian elephants have decreased by more than 64% across the continent -- equating to more than 850 million acres -- since the year 1700, according to research by De Silva published last year .

In India, it is a common sight to see elephants outside of protected areas, crossing man-made roads and landscapes during their daily movements, Ruth Ganesh, co-founder of the conversation nonprofit Elephant Family USA, told ABC News.

" The Great Elephant Migration ," a traveling installation of 100 life-sized elephants, is embarking on a tour throughout the continental U.S. -- first unveiling in New York City's Meatpacking District on Friday before spending a year traveling throughout the country, Ganesh said.

The installation is aimed to represent a "direct imprint" on what is happening in India with elephants and other wildlife that are venturing out of protected areas and into urban centers, Ganesh said.

"Elephants are the ambassador of coexistence," she said.

Their journey began in the forested region of the Nilgiri Hills in the south of India. Each statue is modeled from a real elephant that come into the village of Guluru from the nearby reserves, Ganesh said.

Each elephant was photographed by conservationists "at every angle" before life-sized drawings of the elephants were created on the ground as an outline for steel rebars. Indigenous groups then took Lantana plants, the second-most invasive plant in the world that has taken over 19.2 million acres in India, and cladded the metal frame with it.

Each elephant took three months to make and features a detailed form and shape of the individual it was modeled after, Ganesh said, adding that they are so life-like that people often are compelled to hug them.

"The way their eyes look at you, you get a sense of the real thing," Ganesh said.

The elephants were then transported by individual Jeeps to Cochin, where they were placed in shipping containers. Elephants are so revered in Hinduism that the Jeeps were often getting pulled over so people could pray to the lifelike elephants and offer flowers, Ganesh said.

On Wednesday, the elephants made their way from Rhode Island to New York City via Interstate 95. All 100 elephants were strapped to open-air flat-bed trucks, Ganesh said.

The convoy of eight trucks, with Ganesh following closely behind, garnered some stares from fellow drivers, she said.

"We've gotten a lot of incredulous looks," Ganesh said.

On Friday afternoon, The Great Elephant Migration will be unveiled in New York City's Meatpacking District. The main installation will stretch from Gansevoort Plaza on Ninth Avenue up to West 15th Street, as well as other locations around the District, but there will be elephants sprinkled all over the neighborhood, Ganesh said.

They will remain in New York City until Oct. 20, when they will then travel to Miami for Art Basel. The next stop will be Buffalo Pastures in Browning, Montana, amid the Blackfeet Nation before ending in Los Angeles. The conservation group hopes to add stops to Houston and Glacier National Park, Ganesh said, adding that the herd will remain in the U.S. for 13 months.

Seeing the herds up close will likely offer an unmatched visual for how massive they are and how much space they occupy, the experts said.

The elephants were previously displayed in Bangalore in January and February and during a pilot run in London in 2021. But the herd's American tour is the start of their big debut.

"This American migration was always the dream," Ganesh said.