Two mahouts (elephant trainers) washing elephants at the...

CHIANG SAEN, CHIANG RAI, THAILAND - 2006/12/01: Two mahouts (elephant trainers) washing elephants at the Anantara Golden Triangle Resort. The resort, which maintains a stable of elephants, offers tourist the unique opportunity to become a mahout. Money raised through the property's three-day course - during which guest learn to care for, wash, feed and exercise pachyderms - together with a portion of room rates from the nearby Four Season's Tented Camp is being used to rescue baby and injured elephants off the streets of Thailand's big cities. Two years ago, the World Conservation Union declared the Asian elephant on the verge of extinction. In Thailand alone - a country where elephants have long being revered for their brawn and loyalty, as the Kings divine right to rule and as the spiritual mentor Airavata - elephant numbers have fallen from approximately 400,000 at the turn of the 20th century, to 2500 today. Mechanisation, a ban on commercial logging in the early 1990s, a severe loss in natural habitat and increase in poaching have all led to the elephants precarious status. It is illegal to use elephants to beg, but despite this, figures estimate up to 300 working elephants on the streets of the capital alone. A begging elephant - the younger the better- earns approximately $120 a day in tips, roughly the same as a labourer could expect to earn in a month. (Photo by Leisa Tyler/LightRocket via Getty Images)