Former game show host Bob Barker still wants an Edmonton elephant to come on down to his home state of California, so that it can live out the rest of its days in an elephant sanctuary.

Barker arrived in Edmonton this week to lobby for Lucy, an elephant that has been living at the city-owned Valley Zoo for more than 30 years.

He was supporting the "Free Lucy Campaign," an effort led by Zoocheck Canada, an animal protection charity, to get the elephant relocated to an elephant sanctuary in California. The effort is also supported by Edmonton's Voice 4 Animals.

The campaign to move Lucy has been raging for some time, with Barker and other animal activists demanding that she be relocated and zoo officials insisting that a move could endanger the elephant's health.

However, it appears the efforts may be in vain.

"There's very little agreement on anything," Barker told reporters after meeting with zoo staff.

"One minute they say she's happy and healthy and the next minute they say that she's too ill to travel."

Earlier in the day, Barker told reporters that the Valley Zoo had "come to terms with the fact that elephants cannot be healthy and happy in a zoo."

"The great zoos -- the enlightened zoos -- have closed their elephant exhibits, including the great London Zoo, the Central Park Zoo in new York City, the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago, they've all closed their elephant exhibits," he added.

Barker said the major zoos that have closed their elephant exhibits have not had their attendance drop by "one iota."

Zoocheck Canada has been pushing for the opportunity to have elephant experts visit Lucy to examine her. But Barker claims the Valley Zoo has "adamantly refused" to let that happen until recently.

Last week, the zoo brought in its own consultant, veterinarian James Oosterhuis, who concluded that moving the elephant to a new location would put her life at risk.

According to the zoo's official website, Lucy has problems with arthritis and suffers from respiratory problems as well.

The former Price is Right host has previously said that he accepts that Lucy may currently be in ill health, but he wants her moved once she is well enough to travel.

Barker is one of many celebrities and animal rights groups who say that keeping an elephant in custody without other elephants is akin to torture.

Joyce Poole, an animal behavioural expert who has studied African elephants for decades, recently travelled all the way to Edmonton from Norway to see Lucy.

She told CTV Edmonton that Lucy would be better off with other elephants.

"I think that humans can never really be a substitute for the kind of relationships, friendships, bonds that she could form with other elephants," Poole said in an interview on Wednesday.

Dr. Milton Ness, the Edmonton zoo's veterinarian, disagreed.

"I've spent a lot of time with Lucy, I'm with her every day," he told CTV News Channel. "Lucy is a very social animal, as all elephants are, and she gets her social support from the people around her."

He also said that Lucy previously lived with another elephant in the Edmonton zoo, and that her behaviour remained unchanged when that elephant was moved to a U.S. breeding facility.

With a report from CTV Edmonton's Susan Amerongen and files from The Canadian Press