Some interesting facts about the Establishment of the Elephant Orphanage:
- This elephant orphanage was established in 1977 by Dr Daphne Sheldrick in honour of her newly deceased husband, who died in June of that same year.
- David Sheldrick, was a famous botanist, agronomist, conservationist, naturalist - known for his animal husbandry efforts in Kenya during the three decades from 1945 to his untimely death of a massive heartache in June 1977.
- David and Daphne together spent many years creating and developing Tsavo East National Park and many other Kenyan National Parks, before the Kenyan Wild Life Service was founded.
- Before his death in June 1977 there were 20,000 elephants in the wild in Kenya and today there is only 6,000.
- Dr Daphne Sheldrick is still alive today and sits on the Board of Trustees which operates the David Sheldrick Elephant and Rhino Orphanage.
- The Orphanage is a charitable trust and therefore is funded mostly by benefactors' donations, visitors' fees; and other schemes such as "Adopt An Elephant".
In The Beginning:
David Sheldrick Wild Life Trust provides a "transitional" sanctuary to traumatised elephant calves and to a smaller extent, baby rhinos. These animals have been orphaned mostly by poaching, but also when their mothers die through drought, or when the babies have fallen down mines, pits or drains. Sometimes their mothers have just died of natural causes - one reason is because elephants renew their teeth every ten years but after their 60th year these teeth are not renewed which means they can no longer feed themselves and starve to death! It has been recorded that baby elephants are severely traumatised and emotionally scarred from witnessing the violent death of their mothers by poachers who are after her tusks.
When the babies arrive into the enclosure at the orphanage, you can see run rapidly towards their food and watch them quickly gulp down their baby "giant bottles" made up of a specially formulated milk. Elephant calves are milk-dependent for the first two years of their lives and are intolerant to cow's milk. It took Dr Daphne Sheldrick many yeas of research and trial and error to develop the right milk formula for their babies to grow. The development of elephants are slow and parallels that of the development of human beings - they say elephants are very intelligent animals which possess strong emotional sense.
The Long Journey back to the Wild:
Owing to the resurgence of poaching that has resulted from the partial lifting of the ivory trading ban and the current drought that is currently ravaging the country, the nursery has 21 baby elephants under its care - the higher number ever!
After 2-4 years, depending on their maturity and their ability to look after themselves, the elephant calves are transferred to either one of the Trust's two rehabilitation centres at Tsavo National Park where they spend the next 6-8 years, and where they are incrementally taught how to adjust to life in the wild.
Free At Last:
The elephants are freed into the wild under strict supervision - they are "paired" up with an adoptive elephant family who nurture and oversee the transition into the wild. Sometimes an adoptive family rejects the outsider and the whole process of finding a new adoptive family has to begin again.
But once the orphan is adopted by the family, they soon learn how to survive in the wild. It is said that the mature elephants periodically return to the rehabilitation centres with their own babies to show them off.
Our Trips to the Orphanage:
Visiting this Elephant Orphanage is an absolute delight and an event that no visitor to Kenya should miss. On my first visit there Minke and I arrived around 11am at a very muddy carpark on the edge of the Nairobi National Park. After a short walk through the smelly elephant stables we turned up at a roped area. While we walked, a family of warthogs nonchalantly ambled through the compound.
 |
| Family of Warthogs - Mum, Dad and kids leisurely saunter across the yard! |
Louise, Ray and I visited the Elephant Orphanage on Boxing Day, 26 December 2010 which was great fun. This time there were a lot more visitors and it was a tight squeeze to view the elephants. But I found it as enjoyable as the first visit.
 |
| Baby elephants sleeping stables which they share with their keepers. |
In the enclosure were mounds of dry earth for the baby elephants to play in, blow dirt on themselves - they apparently do this to prevent sunburn, etc; huge in ground water holes for them to swim in and footballs for them to play football and lastly huge drinking bottles of specially formulated milk in order to feed them.
 |
| Baby elephant bottles containing specially formulated milk |
 |
| Swimming hole with footballs Within a few minutes, along came a little elephant, covered with blankets and accompanied by her keeper. She was the youngest of the seven "baby" elephants - six females and one very stroppy male! - and she arrived at the orphanage when she was only one week old. She was only five weeks old and the reason she was covered with blankets was to keep her warm and maintain her body temperature. Most of the orphaned elephants in this group are here because their mothers were murdered by poachers for their ivory. In her natural habitat, this youngest baby elephant would walk closely inbetween her mother and another adult, matriarchal elephant in order to maintain her body temperature and to give her a strong sense of security. Her keeper explained that elephants possess very acute emotions and they have to be nurtured diligently when they lose their mother. Each orphaned calf is assigned a keeper who sleeps with him/her and feeds and adjusts his/her bedding every three hours. |
 |
| Orphaned elephant, 5 weeks old |
 |
| Here they come, running towards their bottles! |
We didn't have to wait very long before the rest of the baby elephant calves came out, accompanied by their keepers. The literally ran down the walkway to head towards their bottles of food!. This group consisted of seven babies altogether - all under 15 months old!
 |
| Baby elephant milk bottles |
 |
| Here the baby is enjoying her milk. As they grow older, the elephants learn how to hold their bottles with their trunks and feed themselves |
 |
| Two big feeding bottles are used and some fast moving dexterity is employed by the keeper to quickly switch bottles once the first bottle is finished |
After the meal was over, the babies played and frolicked; teased, climbed over and rolled on top of each other, joined their trunks in friendship, came up to the fence to scratch their trunks and ears on the wooden posts and "talked" to us. They seemed so "human-like" in their play antics - just playing the same way children do!
 |
| Baby elephant calves playing |
 |
| The keeper shovelling mud over the elephant's body |
 |
| Rolling in the dirt is just a lovely pastime! |
 |
| Playing with my mates |
 |
Such fun!  Elephants fling dirt over their bodies to prevent sunburn on their skin! |
 |
| Baby elephant scratching her trunk on the fence post |
 |
| Elephant friends holding trunks! |
