One of my pet peeves is hearing people refer to an elephant doing his normal thing such as trying to find edible food, mock charging a vehicle, charging someone in protection of her/his elephant family, as ROGUE. I hear the word all the time on wildlife movies and television programs.

Thus I just went to the Webster's online dictionary to see the correct definition of rogue.

It shows in the context of wildlife:

An elephant that has separated from a herd and roams about alone, in which state it is very savage

(of an animal, especially an elephant) Vicious and solitary.

Operating outside of normal controls.

An aggressive animal separate from the herd, especially an elephant.

Savage, vicious, aggressive are terms that should properly be put to ROGUE.

However, if an elephant is eating someone's crop, charging an individual threatening the elephant family or mock charging a vehicle I would think the term rogue should not be used. In that case would it not be more proper to use the term nuisance animal? Is anyone else bothered by this misuse of words?

Yes, Jan, I too hate this term. One can apply the term "Rogue" to any adult male elephant as they are all solitary, occasionally they travel with other males, but they are surely not part of the herd. They come to females only when their hormones urge them to breed.

I don't much care for "Nuisance" animal either as this is in the mind only of one species - Human Beings, who in my experience are a grand nuisance to most human and non-human animals on the planet!

I agree with you Kat. Humans over the years have treated wildlife far worse than they get from wildlife. And it will get much worse in the future. With more and more people moving into areas near the parks and reserves they are taking over the normal wildlife corridors animals use to get from one area to another - and often in areas too arid for farming. Then if they finally get their little patch of maize to grow and an elephant eats it, they want the poor animal killed.

It is the same with people keeping their cattle, goats and sheep near their house and surrouning it with a few scrawny acacia limbs and thinking it will keep out lions! And again with people who have no doors on their houses and want the hyenas who move in during the night destroyed.

Living near wildlife requires responsibility on the part of the humans, and when they do not adequately protect themselves, it is not the animals fault.