For a number of reasons peculiar to Ceylon it is a practical impossibility to make anything but a very approximate estimate of the total elephant population of this island. In 1950, however, the warden of the Department of Wild Life announced the total population to be not much in excess of 1,000 animals; and if we are to work on any figure in assessing the present and future population trend, we must accept this estimate. The warden states further that the annual net increase of the wild population is in the neighbourhood of 6 per cent to 7 per cent which allows for natural deaths, and according to this figure we should, at the close of 1957, have had a total wild elephant population of about 1,500 animals. This, however, takes no account of the number of deaths by gunshot injuries, illicit captures, casualties during periods of intense drought, etc., that take place annually and do not seem to diminish over the years. The result is that, instead of a gradual increase or even the maintenance of a constant population, there is an annual net decrease of approximately thirty animals.