Dublin Zoo has said they are tentatively hopeful one of their cow elephants is pregnant. 

Located in Phoenix Park, the zoo is home to over four hundred different animals from every corner of the globe. 

Four of them are Asian elephants - three of whom are cows and one of whom is an adult bull. 

Elephants at Dublin Zoo. Image: Patrick Bolger/Dublin Zoo

Speaking to The Pat Kenny Show live from Phoenix Park, Elephant Team Leader Christina Murphy said she loves taking care of such “incredibly intelligent, incredibly social” creatures who form such “beautiful family units”. 

Currently, the team is on tenterhooks after the bull, Aung Bo, was spotted mating with one the cows, Samiya. 

“That was about a month ago but we do have to wait 21 long months [to see] if that was a successful mating,” Ms Murphy said. 

“They do have the longest gestation out of any mammal.” 

Dublin Zoo’s 17-year-old Asian Elephant Asha. Image: Dublin Zoo

Elephants poo roughly 20 times a day and their keepers plan on using a sample to carry out a pregnancy test. 

“We take regular poo samples,” Ms Murphy explained. 

“And to know whose poo is whose, we feed them a banna every morning with different colour glitter. 

“Then we have the fun job, myself and my team, of looking through poo and finding red glitter, gold glitter and blue glitter. 

“We send that off to a lab and then they can look at the hormonal samples.” 

The elephant herd at Dublin Zoo. Image: Stephanie Rohan/Newstalk

The Asian elephant is currently a highly endangered species and their numbers have roughly halved in the past 60 to 75 years. 

Habitat loss means they are restricted to just 15% of their original range and there are thought to be only some 50,000 in the wild left.

Main image: Elephants at Dublin Zoo. Image: Patrick Bolger/Dublin Zoo.