Skip to main content

Ellie Love

 

This photo is Africa! A breeding herd of female Elephants hanging around a river, bathing, frolicking, and relaxing, is an iconic scene that I could watch for hours. Never an animal to linger anywhere for too long, Ndlovus (Zulu) stealthily roam the veld, eating hundreds of pounds of food a day. Always on the move, an elephant can travel up to fifty miles a day, occasionally stopping by water to drink and cool themselves or perhaps to wait until a female gives birth. Sometimes the entire family unit circles around a female delivering a new calf to the herd, protecting her from all sides. 


The matriarch, sometimes the oldest female, rules in an elephant community. She must have wisdom, have a proven record of leadership, protect her herd from all dangers, teach the young about proper elephant behavior, and have the experience and confidence to guide her herd through the dangerous life in the bush. 


These powerful descendants of the wooly mammoth are also quite dangerous. I can’t tell you how many times I have rounded a corner and come face to face with one lone Elephant or a herd crossing the road. I have learned how to drive in reverse as easily as going forward. Don’t mess with Ellies. They’ll flip a car with their powerful bodies as easily as a human turns over a stone. 


Elephants with a memory of humans hurting or killing someone in their family are particularly dangerous. It’s true; they do not forget the tragedies caused by human interference, human greed, and human’s disregard for an Elephant’s life. Humans = danger! Humans = the greatest threat to elephants!


Aside from dealing with homo sapiens, the great destroyer of all things beautiful, Elephants are intelligent, compassionate, generous, social, and magnificent examples of how to care for each other.


There’s so much more to go on about when it comes to ellies. But for now, I don’t know about you, but I want to be more like an Elephant. 


#elephantlove #elliesinthebush #writing #lastmonthsinsouthafrica #beanelephant #elephants



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Golden Glow of the Bush

  The Golden Glow of the Bush I have seen some glorious skies during my travels around the world, from the smog-induced fluorescent sunsets in Moscow to the burning red horizon in Lake Tahoe. Looking up toward the heavens at dusk is my favorite time of day.  But, nowhere have I ever been so mesmerized by the setting sun than in the bush. Why? Because the light the fading sun casts on the landscape is like no other. Call it the golden hour or the magic hour, or the hour when a quiet hush blankets the land as day turns to night. Birds sing their bedtime songs, jackals practice their forlorn calls, and predators wake, yawning widely, preparing for the hunt. The fading light signals transformation from the brightness to darkness, from things seen to those unseen.  Lazy, sleeping lions transform from looking like cuddly stuffed animals to ferocious stalkers of anything that moves. Hunger calls them to action, stealthy and relentless in their pursuit. Owls waken, looking for bu...

Super Mom

  Super Mom   Super Mom    Seeing a coalition of eight cheetahs in the bush is more than a lucky sighting; it is rare and magical. What's even crazier is that my friends and I had already seen this family many times during the year and a half before taking this photo. Here's their story. Two cheetah sisters had two litters around the same time. Sister one had six cubs, and sister two or three cubs. For whatever unexplainable reason, one of sister two's cubs migrated to sister one's family, making her the mother of seven. She quickly acquired the moniker of Super Mom by all the rangers in the park. One mom, seven cubs. She had to chase them all around when they were babies, feed them (they have about a 58% success rate when chasing down a meal), teach them the ways of the bush, and most of all, keep them safe. Whenever we saw them, they were healthy, playful, and did whatever mom told them to do - move, rest, get down from a tree, get out of the road, stay quiet! We g...

Ranger Dean

  This young man is Dean, and he is a ranger at Tandala Trail Camp in the Dinokeng Reserve. Dean is not just any ranger; he is my favorite ranger. At 25, his wealth of knowledge about bush flora and fauna equals any seasoned ranger I have gone with to the bush. In this photo, Dean hopped out of the vehicle to explain why elephants eat the bark of certain trees. It is because the bark of some trees is sweet and delicious. Dean also explained that the damage done to the trees will kill them unless the ellies only tear the bark from one side. If there is bark left on one side, the tree can mend itself, basically grow back the bark that acts as a shield against destructive weather and invading insects.   There are many things that I appreciate about Dean. His ability to identify birds by their call, tracking skills, and knowledge of the flora are remarkable. But the best thing is that he won’t carry a gun. Instead, he has a long stick that can help control a situation if an a...