August began with a happy reunion when Zongoloni and Lima Lima brought all the ‘nightclubbers’ home, with the exception of Ziwa, who remained with his new wild herd. The Keepers were happy to see a full house, with all the independent and dependent orphans mingling together.
Zongoloni and Lima Lima brought back all the night clubbers, with the exception of Ziwa, who remained with the wild herd. The Keepers were happy to see a full house with all the night clubbers and the orphans together.
Zongoloni must have been feeling very mischievous today. When the Keepers returned from their lunch, they found that Zongoloni had led all the babies away. The Keepers immediately began searching, they split up and went in different directions, whistling and calling the orphans by name, in the hopes the orphans would hear and come back to them. Luckily Ngasha pushed one of the babies, who then screamed, alerting the Keepers to where the babies were. The Keepers headed quickly in the direction of the scream and found the orphans. However, Kiasa was still missing, Zongoloni had lured her away from the others. Quanza and Kiombo had tried to persuade Kiasa not to follow Zongoloni but they failed. It was only after a long conversation with Sonje, who had blocked Kiasa’s path, that she decided to return to the orphan herd. Zongoloni joined her, as she didn’t want to be left alone. Both Kiasa and Zongoloni came back to the stockades that evening.
The drought has affected all the animals in one way or another. Lima Lima and Zongoloni were staying with the orphan herd more than usual, making the most of the lucerne pellet supplement. Jasiri tried to get them to go with him into the bush, but they know how dry it is and how hard it is to find enough food, so Lima Lima and Zongoloni decided to stay with the orphan herd.
The orphans followed the Keepers to the top of the Umani Hills were there was much more fresh vegetation to browse on. The Keepers prepared the milk bottles as the orphans fed on the vegetation. The orphans had full bellies but there was still found space for their milk.
Ngasha, as usual went to go and bother Murera, but she saw him coming and did not feel safe, so she moved away, not wanting to get pushed around. Murera then moved over to where her closest friend, the gentle, Mwashoti was eating.
Quanza has become very protective of Kiasa. When Zongoloni came over to persuade Kiasa to go with her, Quanza quickly came over to persuade Kiasa otherwise. Sonje has also started positioning herself so that she can block Zongoloni from leaving with Kiasa. However, Zongoloni managed to make the whole herd follow her in the direction she wanted to go. The Keepers were not happy with the path she had chosen, it had lots of lava rocks, which made it difficult for Murera to follow.
Faraja and Alamaya appeared in the middle of the path; they had come from the forest where they had spent the last couple of days. With the distraction of the boys, Zongoloni saw her chance and once again tried to sneak Kiasa away. The Keepers realised her intentions and stopped her.
The whole herd, including Kiasa and Zongoloni, followed the Keepers back. It was very hot. Sonje decided to lead the herd to the waterhole to cool off. She walked very quickly taking the most direct path. The orphan herd had a fun time playing in the mud bath and swimming. It even turned into a competition, with all of them showing off their abilities. Enkesha won the best swimmer today.
Many wild elephants came today with the nightclubbers. All of them came to the stockades for the lucerne pellets. It was amazing to see the wild elephants and the orphan herd all happily eating together. Lima Lima and Zongoloni are the ones that introduced the wild bulls to lucerne pellets. The wild bulls had followed Lima Lima and Zongoloni to the stockades, they had seen them eating the lucerne and after a while, the wild elephants were brave enough to try the lucerne too.
Faraja with Jasiri arrived to join the orphan herd. Ngasha, as usual, tried to push Faraja away, but he teamed up with Jasiri and they were too strong for Ngasha. Jasiri and Faraja chased Ngasha away from the orphan herd and towards the Umani Springs.
A wild bull approached Sonje and Kiombo. He put his trunk up to smell Sonje, then realising she was not interested, he left her alone to browse in peace. The wild bull paid no attention to Murera, to her relief. He moved on to greet Quanza but soon moved on from her as well. The wild bull left the orphan herd altogether, realising that none of the females were interested in him.
The orphans went past the waterhole on their way back to the stockades, splashing their chests, to cool off, after a long hot day.
This morning, Kiombo and his sparring partner, Maktao, started their daily pushing match, testing their strength on each other. They don’t fight each other as enemies, but rather like a game between friends.
It is very dry around Umani at the moment. This seems to have made all the animals tolerate each other like friends; antelopes and baboons now walk along together in peace. The baboons climb up the acacia trees and the antelopes feed on the pods that fall. Enkesha and Alamaya want to get the acacia pods that fall from the trees too, they get jealous of the antelopes and they chase them away. The baboons were also scared off by the elephants, relocating to some acacia trees further away. Alamaya has decided he is now in charge of shaking the trees to get the pods down. Sonje brought the whole orphan herd under the trees for shade and to enjoy the pods.
In the afternoon some buffalos arrived at the waterhole, desperate for water to drink. They found the orphans wallowing in the mud bath; Quanza saw the buffaloes first and raised the alarm. Murera began trumpeting loudly, which scared the buffaloes, they ran back to the bushes waiting until the orphans had left the waterhole before they came in to drink.
Maktao and Kiombo had a very spirited pushing match today which almost developed into a real fight, because Maktao pushed Kiombo, who then got caught by a rock and fell over. He was struggling to get up, but Maktao kept pushing him down. This made Kiombo angry and upset. When he finally managed to get up, he pushed Maktao really hard, showing that he was angry. Luckily, Quanza came to separate the two boys before it got more serious. She had a hard time trying to calm Kiombo down, so Quanza rumbled to Sonje for reinforcements. She arrived and took her little friend Kiombo away.
The orphan herd with Sonje, Quanza and Alamaya leading, moved to the Kenzili area for more vegetation to feed on. Murera and Mwashoti didn’t follow the herd, they chose to walk in another direction, Murera felt that Kenzili was too far for her to walk today. Alamaya took the lead and kept walking but Sonje stopped when Kiombo had rumbled to her, he was asking her to stop so he could rest for a minute. The journey was too far to walk without stopping to rest and to browse. Murera was smart not to follow Sonje blindly. It was a long way to Kenzili and then a long way back home.
Zongoloni and Lima Lima brought all the nightclubbers back to the stockades early this morning when the orphans were being let out of their stables. With the nightclubbers in the mix, the Umani herd looked huge, a headcount showed that it was a full house. The current drought has brought all the nightclubbers back to the stockade more often, to feed on the supplementary lucerne pellets. Zongoloni and Lima Lima were very happy eating lucerne, and they were happy to share with the other wildlife, including some buffaloes that were waiting their turn nearby.
Ngasha and Faraja met up again, but as usual, they did not get on. Ngasha walked closely behind Faraja, trying to annoy him and get close enough to start a pushing match. Faraja had seen Ngasha and was aware of his plan, so he moved over to where Jasiri was browsing. Faraja knows that Jasiri is the only one who can keep Ngasha in check. Jasiri wants to protect Faraja and stop Ngasha from bullying so he pushes him away from the herd. Faraja and Jasiri moved away to browse on the hills, Jasiri keeping Ngasha away.
A wild herd appeared from the Chyulu hills. As Zongoloni took Lima Lima to greet them, she realized that Ziwa was with them. Lima Lima had a long discussion with Ziwa, trying to persuade him to join the nightclubbers in the Kibwezi forest. The female leader of the wild herd trumpeted warning Ziwa to stay with her and the wild herd, he responded, quickly walking back to join her.
The Keepers have been dropping lucerne pellets and hay in areas around the Kibwezi Forest to help the other wild animals. It is getting drier and finding enough food is getting harder. Lots of wild animals are congregating at the lucerne drops as they have realised how much of a help the supplementary food is. During the night a big herd of buffaloes were feeding together with Jasiri, Lima Lima, Zongoloni, and Mwashoti, just a few meters from the waterhole. Some wild elephants also joined in, happy to get some lucerne and hay to fill their bellies.
Murera spotted the wild families browsing with the orphans. She was nervous and moved further away, putting a lot of distance between herself and the wild elephants. A little while later she saw two little babies in the wild herd and moved closer to get a better look at the babies. Murera even tried to get one of the babies to follow her but the mother saw just in time and came running over to get her baby. Murera ran away quickly, not wanting to get pushed by the angry mother.
Kiombo and Maktao started fighting over some green seed pods. Luckily Kiombo found some pods to eat and Maktao was very jealous so he started pushing Kiombo trying to get the pods off him. Sonje, who was watching all of this, did not like to see Maktao trying to deny his friend Kiombo of the pods. Sonje heard Kiombo complaining and rushed over, only to find they were now fighting over some lucerne.
Some of the orphans were in a funny mood today because of the cold weather. Murera and Sonje did their usual morning inspections, going from room to room, making sure all the babies were awake and ready for the day. The babies were all fine, but Murera and Sonje were quieter than normal; the cold morning made their bad legs stiffer. After a short time walking, the stiffness had gone.
Some crocodiles were out of the water, trying to find some sunshine to bask in but it was still overcast and cold. Quanza and Jasiri crossed over to the other side of the water, to where some bushbuck and baboons were eating the dry grass. Luckily the elephants did not get scared by the crocodiles, they just carried on with their mission to annoy the bushbuck. Zongoloni and Faraja went to join their friends on the other side. Faraja proceeded to charge and trumpet at the bushbucks and the baboons, chasing them out of the thicket. The baboons fled making the bushes tremble.
Ngasha and Ziwa found each other while browsing along the Kenzili area. It was an unexpected encounter. Ziwa recognised Ngasha, who was obliviously browsing, and walked right up to him. Ngasha was very confused: Why would a wild bull approach him like a good friend? Ngasha got scared and started to run away when he realised that it was Ziwa, who had brought his wild family to greet Ngasha!
Alamaya and his nightclubber friends, Faraja and Jasiri, returned back to the orphan herd to find that Lima Lima was already there. She welcomed them back very happily. Then they joined the other orphans at the dust bath.
Sonje and the babies were busy playing in the dust, throwing clouds of dust over their backs and faces. The orphans were so covered in dust that even the Keepers were struggling to tell some of the orphans apart. Alamaya was easy to spot with his missing tail. Zongoloni, her friend Kiasa, and Mwashoti changed direction and headed back to the Kenzili area. It is very dry all around, and it is getting harder to find enough food, but the Kibwezi forest remains a good place to browse. Zongoloni and Kiasa moved to feed on the acacia pods under the trees that had some baboons sitting on the top. All the orphans are eager for these pods, they have also started eating the bark of the acacia trees and pulling down branches to feed on.
Murera and Quanza stayed away from the mud bath, while the orphans were enjoying a lovely peaceful mud bath. Then Ngasha arrived. As usual, he was a bully, not knowing how to play gently with the others. As the orphan herd was walking past the waterhole, heading towards the Kenzili area the Keepers spotted two baby warthogs disappearing into the bushes with their tails up. They were scared of the orphan herd. Lima Lima and Mwashoti sensed this, Mwashoti chased them. making loud trumpeting noises and giving the warthogs a hard time.
There was a big celebration when Jasiri arrived back at the stockades this morning. He immediately went over to the pellets corner. The babies were already eating as many pellets as they could. When the herd saw Jasiri all the female leaders, Zongoloni, Lima Lima, Sonje, Quanza, even Murera welcomed him into the herd. They were happy to see him as they would get some peace from Ngasha. Ngasha on the other hand did not look happy to see Jasiri.
Lima Lima and Mwashoti snuck back into stockade compound and into the lucerne store. A Keeper found them, but Lima Lima had already taken a bale. Luckily Mwashoti had not yet managed to get another bale and he ran away when he saw the Keeper approaching. Lima Lima knew she was wrong to take the bale, so she dropped the lucerne and ran away too.
Lima Lima went and found Sonje, and Quanza up in the Umani hills where they had taken the orphan herd looking for branches to browse on. Murera and her friend Mwashoti did not follow them to the top of the hills but instead they both remained browsing at the base of the hill.
More and more wildlife are now coming to the Umani Springs area to find refuge from the drought. The wildlife in the Chyulu Hills is moving to the Umani springs, realizing that there is food and water. The Keepers have been putting out food, lucerne pellets and hay for the orphans, the wild elephants and other wild animals. Some of the wildlife has even come to know that the sound of the Keepers’ wheelbarrows means food. When they hear the Keepers, they come out of the bushes in large numbers. The Keepers walk away, giving them a peaceful environment where they feel safe.
Maktao and his friend Kiombo are always playing and showing off. They have their pushing matches in front of the Keepers, so they can be the judges. Murera and Quanza, meanwhile, were only interested in eating and did not want to follow the Keepers when they were called. Maktao looked relaxed and happy standing next to a Keeper, patiently waiting for Murera and Quanza to join them.
Some wild elephants tried to follow the orphans up the Umani Hills today. A junior bull was the first to appear and follow the orphan herd, then two more bulls came through a bit later. These two bulls found Sonje and Zongoloni, who were still browsing at the bottom of the hill.
The orphan herd found some small branches and palm trees. The babies, Kiasa, Maktao, and Kiombo were fighting for the branches and pushing each other. Sonje walked to where they were fighting to see what was happening, especially because she heard her little friend Kiombo. The Keepers got there first and saw that Maktao had pushed Kiombo over, and they were keeping him down, the little elephant was screaming. Quanza and Zongoloni also rushed over to help. Quanza then stood in between them, making sure they couldn’t get to each other. Kiombo saw his friend Sonje arrive, he stood up and left the battle group retreating to her side.
Ngasha pushed Sonje, which Jasiri witnessed. He became angry and chased Ngasha to the edge of the herd, allowing Sonje and the babies to have some peace.
Last night there was a very light shower, which cooled the hot temperatures that Umani has been experiencing. After a long period of drought, the tetse flies have not been so bad, but today they were bothering Murera. Lima Lima arrived from the Chyulu area to enjoy some time with the orphan herd but she was being followed by a swarm of tetse flies, so the orphans all ran away from her, not wanting to get bitten. The babies all started running in different directions, Kiasa, Kombo, Alamaya and Zongoloni took a different path trying to get away from the orphans that had tetse flies on them. Their plan didn’t work, they bumped into buffaloes coming the opposite direction down the path, these buffaloes had even more tetse flies than the orphans that they were running away from.
Mwashoti, Alamaya and Sonje relocated to look for waterholes and mud baths so that they would find some water to drink and wallow in the mud to keep the flies off. A hamerkop bird was walking into the water, Alamaya hadn’t noticed and got a fright. He turned round quickly with his ears flared. He could not work out what it was and ran away not feeling secure with what was around him. Two warthogs with a baby were also walking to the waterhole, Kiasa and Quanza spotted the tiny baby warthog and started a game of charging the warthog, who got scared and ran away with their tails in the air.
The orphans came out of their stockades this morning, then began walking towards the Umani Hills. Sonje was leading the Umani herd, and Murera, as usual was at the back. Murera came across a tortoise, but she thought it was rock, because there were stones all over the path. She must have tapped it with her foot, because the tortoise got a fright and made a funny noise. This, in turn, scared Murera. She startled with lots of loud trumpeting, then started charging at the bushes, showing her anger. Mwashoti and some of the other orphans heard all the commotion and came to find out what all the trumpeting was about.
Last night, Ziwa arrived at the stockades with his wild elephant family. When Sonje and Murera recognised that he was among the herd walking along the stockade fence line, they made quiet rumbling sounds. Walking outside to establish the reason for the rumbling, one of the Keepers realised that Ziwa was there and that the orphans were chatting to their former friend.
Murera, Sonje and Quanza were trying to convince him to remain behind so that they could link up again in the morning. Ziwa could not be persuaded because his new family would not wait and he moved off with them to the Umani Springs area. The ex-orphan was so lucky when he graduated because a wild family adopted him immediately.
In the morning, after eating their lucerne pellets, the orphans set off to follow the scent of the wild elephants in an attempt to find Ziwa. After a long walk, Sonje stopped the herd as they had not found their old friend and she did not want to continue. Undeterred, Jasiri, Ngasha and Zongoloni continued to trace the path left by Ziwa and her wild friends until midday, when they abandoned the search, returning to the orphans who had stayed with Sonje, Murera and the Keepers.
This morning, Kiasa, Zongoloni and Faraja decided to spend time on their own and distanced themselves from the herd, excluding all the nightclubbers except for Lima Lima. After some greetings and interaction, Kiasa and Zongoloni wandered away together. Sonje was joined by Kiombo as she led the other orphans to the top of Umani Hill where there is still plenty of food.
Kiombo spotted some acacia tubers and, without wasting time, began digging in the ground for more. As always, Maktao approached him and began play fighting with his friend. Only this time it was a real confrontation as Kiombo was defending his tubers. He had dug deeper than Maktao and he was not sharing his spoils – to the orphans, acacia roots are tasty like potatoes! Sonje did her best to stop the boys fighting and to separate them.
Feeling defeated by Kiombo, Maktao walked over to Enkesha, his close friend, to tell her about the fight. Enkesha placed her trunk over the downcast boy’s head and round his cheeks to comfort him.
It was a calm, hot day as the elephant orphans walked all the way from Umani Hill back to the midday bottle feeding point before trundling into the water hole for a mud bath. After Sonje and Murera plunged in together, Sonje hosed water onto her chest using her trunk as she was burning hot and loving the mud bath. Next, it was the turn of Kiasa and Kiombo to splash into the waterhole before Mwashoti arrived with the big boys.
The playful, peaceful atmosphere changed as Ngasha pushed his way into the waterhole to wallow in the thick mud. Soon, some of the babies were trumpeting with annoyance as they no longer had enough space to play. Hoping to allow the smaller orphans to keep splashing and swimming, Jasiri pushed Ngasha out of the mud bath. Soon after, however, everyone deserted the waterhole for the surrounding bushes.
With the Keepers looking after the babies, Sonje led the older orphans into the Chyulu Hills in the afternoon. Groups of antelopes and baboons waited for the elephants to pass through before enjoying the pods they had collected from the trees.
The night was full of animal noises – hyenas screaming, followed by baboons, and wild elephants trumpeting loudly from the direction of Umani Springs. The orphans in their stockades were upset by the commotion. Murera and Sonje suspected that something was wrong and urgently alerted the Keepers by pushing at their gates. Enkesha and her friend and neighbour Maktao were together, as Maktao had pulled down the gate that separated the two orphans. Inspecting the stockades, the Keepers found nothing, although they could hear elephants fighting and they felt that the bushes towards the hills had an air of tension. It was not long before the nightclubbers came running home as the wild elephants continued to trumpet.
In the morning, Sonje sneaked her trunk out in between the posts, trying to calm the nightclubbers from inside her stockade. The Keepers opened the gates but stopped the orphans from setting off in the direction of the wild elephants. Murera and Sonje were happy to oblige but it took Zongoloni time to convince the herd to follow the two matriarchs towards the Chyulu Hills.
Unfortunately, four big buffaloes blocked their way to the hills, so big boys Jasiri and Ngasha decided to clear the path. When they saw Jasiri and Ngasha coming towards them, the buffaloes panicked. Mwashoti and Alamaya supported their efforts by trumpeting and were congratulated for being brave boys by the Keepers.
All went well this morning until it was time for Sonje to lead the whole herd away from the lucerne feeding area.
Instead of following her, Ngasha went to stand under an acacia tree and Jasiri and Alamaya walked directly towards him. Suspecting that his rival Jasiri was on a mission, Ngasha turned his body and assumed a defensive position. Jasiri knocked him from behind, forcing him to turn his forehead so that they met head on. Before Ngasha could react, Alamaya crossed and stood in between them but Jasiri pushed Alamaya to the side. Ngasha tried to defend himself but Jasiri was too strong, pushing him several times while he was down. Ngasha got up and ran away to hide as Alamaya and Jasiri celebrated by trumpeting loudly and charging trees. Sonje, Murera, Mwashoti, and the other girls did not look back to see what the boys were fighting over, possibly because they have been bothering Murera.
As the Chyulu area has been hit by a severe drought, many wild families including Ziwa’s have been visiting the stockades in search of food. Today the Keepers received news of more wildfires in Kenzili, with the flames and smoke driving many animals towards the stockades.
Ziwa with his wild herd, comprising a bull, a matriarch, two young elephants and two baby boys, arrived today at around the time orphans were returning home. Ziwa has taught his family about the place to find lucerne hay and pellets and they approached with ease. When they arrived, they found other wild animals eating the orphans’ pellets and lucerne.
Around the same time, Sonje was bringing her herd home and Zongoloni and Lima Lima were leading the nightclubbers. On their arrival, they found that their wild friends had eaten all the lucerne. The Keepers had to bring more food although their wheelbarrow scared away the wild elephants. The nightclubbers were happy to share their food but the youngest boy, Mwashoti, could not find a space so moved to the side, Seeing him, kind Lima Lima gave him a bunch of lucerne.
Many animals are arriving at Umani Springs every day; at night, the Keepers continue to hear the sounds of wild elephants. More and more wild friends are arriving in the area with the nightclubbers who, feeling threatened by the wildfires on the top of the Chyulu Hills, are gravitating towards the safety of home and to their trusted Keepers.
Today, Lima Lima and Zongoloni walked back towards the stockades with Mwashoti but left Alamaya as he had refused to come home. The three elephants greeted the Keepers who were with Enkesha and Kiasa. Kiasa was so happy to see her friend Zongoloni who in turn called to her and then they hugged each other.
Ziwa arrived later to visit the orphans. He did his best to protect Jasiri from being bullied or chased by his wild friends. However, when a bull with huge tusks approached Jasiri as he was pulling down the branches of an acacia tree, the orphan was fearful and ran away in the direction of Umani Hill.
Sonje was watching how Jasiri, despite being the big boy in the orphans’ herd, had been chased away. Faraja and Ziwa also stayed, enjoying the company of the younger wild bulls. Later on, Ziwa and his herd linked up again and headed off towards the bushes around Kenzili.
Today was a really hot day. The Keepers found some wild elephants and buffaloes together close to a water hole with both needing to drink. As the elephants wanted to swim, they gave the buffaloes time to drink first and go, with the elephants remaining to drink and swim so as to cool down.
Kiasa and Zongoloni were so hot that they could not wait for the buffaloes to leave. Kiasa pushed her way through the buffaloes – but finding herself surrounded, she cried out loudly to Zongoloni for help. As soon as Zongoloni heard Kiasa, Zongoloni also trumpeted loudly, asking the orphans for support. Then the whole herd scared off the crowding buffaloes, allowing them to reach Kiasa. The Keepers were very impressed at how the orphans stepped up in solidarity to help one of their babies, chasing away the buffaloes and enabling little Kiasa to drink.
Acting independently, Murera remained in the same space when the other elephants rushed to help Kiasa at the waterhole. She continued to browse peacefully with her best friend Mwashoti as the Keepers and big orphans rushed to help Kiasa. Murera was aware that the big crowd could hurt her and so chose to keep browsing rather than help the young orphan.
Today, the Keepers found it very hard to persuade Sonje and the herd to follow their lead at browsing time. In contrast to other days, Sonje did not walk towards the Keepers. The other orphans turned their backs as well and instead followed Sonje as she walked off in a different direction. The Keepers were in a dilemma as they watched Sonje, in search of lots of bushes to browse on, and her troops heading towards the Kenze area of the Kibwezi Forest, rather than the area of their choice.
Ziwa then arrived from an unexpected direction to say ‘jambo’ to his old friends. He was accompanied by his adopted mother who trumpeted loudly to prevent Ziwa from leaving the wild herd to greet the orphans. Instead, he followed the wild ones back into the Chyulu Hills.
Lima Lima stepped in to sort out a fight today between Maktao and his rival Kiombo over a stick that both were claiming as their own. When the fight started between the junior boys, Lima Lima slowly walked over to separate them, picking up the stick and restoring order. Unfortunately, Sonje then moved behind, took the stick from Lima Lima, and handed it back to Kiombo. Maktao reacted by becoming upset and behaving in an aggressive manner, as Lima Lima watched on in disbelief. The Keepers intervened, taking away the stick and dispersing the elephants. Sonje then led the herd to another location so that the fighting boys would forget and return to browsing.
Later in the day at the waterhole, most of the orphans really enjoyed the midday mud bath, although Quanza, Jasiri and Zongoloni did not want to wallow or even test the water. In contrast, Alamaya and Faraja had a great time cooling off in deep water with only their trunks and heads sticking out. In the afternoon as the orphans were heading home, some of them returned to the mud bath to cool off as the sun was very hot.
There are many buffaloes in the Umani area at the moment. Today, some of them surrounded the herd of orphans, browsing too closely and disturbing the babies. Looking behind her, Lima Lima found two buffaloes grazing close by. She turned and trumpeted loudly to scare them away but instead the buffaloes waited for the herd to react. Enkesha and Quanza clearly also felt uncomfortable. A few minutes later, Zongoloni, Faraja and Jasiri joined the orphans, and were welcomed by Lima Lima. Jasiri and the other boys raised up their ears, asking the buffalos what they were doing among the herd, and the two animals ran away to the Kenzili area.
After this incident, the Keepers instructed Sonje to take the herd in a different direction and avoid the buffaloes. Listening to Sonje, Enkesha and Maktao directed the other little boys to follow them away from Kenzili. As Kiasa and Kiombo were browsing near Umani Hill, two warthogs sprinted out of the bushes, scaring Kiombo who was pulling down branches to eat. He moved towards Sonje, feeling unsure of what the warthogs were doing. As a result of the commotion, Sonje and the orphans were all on alert and charged the bushes together to scare away the warthogs.
A wild herd that included six females and four tiny babies arrived quite early in the morning today. The family had learned from our ex-orphans about lucerne pellets and hay. They also clearly got the memo to arrive just as the Keepers were filling the wheelbarrows with hay. They got to the feeding area before the orphans came in from the forest with their Keepers and started to guard the area, preventing even baboons from joining them.
The wild elephants may have known about the place, but not how the food would arrive! As a Keeper pushed his wheelbarrow filled with lucerne towards the area, the matriarch of the wild herd charged him, believing him to be a threat rather than the bearer of pellets. The Keeper immediately dropped the lucerne and turned back towards the stockades. In the meantime, Zongoloni walked up to the wild elephants and greeted them. Thereafter, the wild elephants joined Zongoloni, Jasiri and Ngasha and ate the lucerne together although the big boys carefully put some hay to the side for the babies.
Lima Lima found herself in trouble when she confidently moved into the wild herd and placed her trunk over one of the babies. The mother was very protective of her baby and kicked Lima Lima, forcing her away from the wild elephants. She loves babies and may have been hoping to look after one of the wild ones!
This morning, Ngasha injured himself trying to mount Zongoloni, who moved away before he could lift his front legs onto her. Then he fell backwards and ended up lying on one side with a sprained leg. In need of attention, he limped over to where the Keepers were sitting to show them his injury and they applied some medication. During the incident, Sonje and Murera watched him approach but moved away rather than welcoming him. Jasiri and the other babies also ignored him, possibly because Ngasha has in the past been rude to his friends.
Later in the day as everyone was having a good time wandering in the forest, busily looking for acacia trees so they could peel off the bark, many baboons and antelopes approached them. They were hoping to share the pods on the branches. Not trusting the animals, Enkesha ran off but Quanza faced up to the perceived threat and prevented the others from following. Alamaya and Mwashoti joined her and together they chased away the baboons.
In the early morning, after emerging from their stockades, Murera and Sonje were joined at the lucerne feeding area by Lima Lima who arrived with all the nightclubbers. Soon, Jasiri, Ziwa and Faraja were clashing over the remaining pellets as baboons gathered to eat the left overs. Usually the ‘table cleaners’, as the Keepers call them, wait until the orphans have disappeared but not today. Rather than stand up to the baboons, Jasiri and Faraja walked away with Murera into the forest. Mwashoti, however, with the support of several smaller orphans, charged and trumpeted at the baboons for quite some time, doing his best to chase them away.
Towards midday, the orphans returned to the mud bath from Kenzili which is a long distance away. Sonje chose the best short cuts as she knew the younger orphans were hot and thirsty for their bottles. Kiasa, Maktao, Enkesha and Kiombo were the first to arrive at the mud bath, having almost raced each other back. Enkesha and Kiombo were being really competitive, with Kiombo keen to be first and overtaking Enkesha as they came closer to the bottles.
Lima Lima was not her happy self this morning – she was walking slowly and feeling unwell. Noticing this, Sonje went over to her and stayed with her. The Keepers were also concerned, thinking that Lima Lima could have eaten something bad especially as everything is so dry. Sonje, Murera, Kiombo and the others wisely left Lima Lima with the Keepers and headed off. She was taken back to her stockade and given some medication but soon felt better and demanded to be allowed out so she could join her friends.
When the orphans trooped back to the midday bottle feeding point and mud bath, they found Lima Lima feeling much better and wallowing as she waited for her friends. After gulping down their bottles, Sonje and Quanza led the elephants off in the direction of the Chyulu Hills, with the herd eating acacia branches as they wandered along. Suddenly, Enkesha and Maktao started running and trumpeting loudly, surprising the Keepers. The source of the commotion was soon established, as Zongoloni and Limalima gestured to the top of a tree where a leopard’s legs could be seen dangling from a branch. The Keepers walked quietly away with the orphans, some of whom had to be persuaded to stop charging the tree.
Today, Ngasha, Zongoloni and Jasiri led the nightclubbers to the top of Umani Hills to join the other orphans and the Keepers. But, to everyone’s surprise, they were accompanied by a wild bull. Feeling fearful, Alamaya and Mwashoti rumbled to each other and then moved away from the huge bull. A few minutes later, the herd gathered together and then the wild bull, scenting humans, ran away into the bushes.
After browsing for the rest of the morning, the orphans returned for their midday bottles and bath. As Mwashoti was rushing into the water hole to cool off, he spotted some warthogs wallowing and playing. Deciding that the warthogs must be chased away, he trumpeted loudly with the support of Quanza. Soon, many of the orphans were charging into bushes, kicking at trees and trumpeting to make absolutely sure that the warthogs had all left.
The ongoing drought has led to many animals gathering in the area around Umani Springs in search of food. Today, while the orphans were on their day patrol towards Umani Hill, many buffaloes blocked the pathways. Strong boy Alamaya with Mwashoti moved around them to create a path for the orphans to follow Sonje and Murera to the top of the hill. Then, they bravely overpowered the buffaloes, forcing them to scatter on the slopes of Umani Hills.
When Murera, Sonje and Lima Lima saw Alamaya and Mwashoti coming to join them at the top of the hill, the big girls welcomed them, rumbling in joy and celebration as the boys continued to trumpet and charge at shrubs. The Keepers were very relieved to see the young boy heroes dispatch the buffalos, thereby also protecting their carers.
Towards midday as the orphans returned to the stockades, thirsty Enkesha and her friend Maktao sprinted for their bottles as Zongoloni and Lima Lima escorted the other babies to the feeding place and then on to the water hole. The nightclubbers trailed along behind but knew that they would not be given milk. Kiombo stayed close to Sonje for protection from Faraja and Ngasha as well as Ziwa who had arrived in the company of wild elephants. Ziwa spent a short time with the orphans before disappearing into the bush with his wild adopted friends.