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We watched a beautiful sunrise over the compound today, which faces east. The orphans had their milk bottles as usual and then went to feed on the lucerne supplements. A wild elephant bull visited this morning but he wasn’t very friendly to the Keepers so he might have been a stranger to the area. Later the orphans and the Keepers walked out to the bush.

Pare and Dololo enjoyed browsing together this morning. Mutara's herd later arrived to join the babies along with Kithaka, Orwa, Turkwel and Kibo among them. 

Mutara, Sities, Suguta and Turkwel usually have one ambition when they join the dependent babies, and that is to steal their favourite Dololo and walk away to spend the day with him. This habit is well-known to the Keepers however and they always have an eye on them.

Just before 11am, all the orphans walked towards the mud bath so the dependent babies could have their milk bottles. Dololo was escorted there by Mutara’s group. Kalama joined in as well as the orphans walked to the mud bath, and when they arrived she started playing in the water with Kanjoro who they found already there, and Mutara. Kalama later came out and started playing on the soil mounds. The rest of the ex-orphans, led by Suguta, led the dependent orphans back out to browse. 

Back out in the bush all the orphans concentrated on browsing, but the Keepers remained very alert and kept an eye on Dololo as it only takes a moment for him to walk off with Mutara’s herd! Suguta watched over Dololo as he browsed, and as it turned out the Keepers didn’t need to worry today as Mutara and her herd were well behaved. 

Mutara’s herd consisting of Suguta, Sities, Turkwel, Kibo, Kanjoro, Kithaka, Lemoyian, Garzi and Orwa joined the orphans as they browsed in the Kone area this morning. As always, Dololo was happy to have his big sisters around and this gave him courage to challenge the other boys too, as he knew he was under the protection of the older girls in Mutara’s herd! 

The orphans browsed calmly up to mud bath time when the ex-orphans escorted the dependent babies to the mud bath. It wasn’t very hot, so the orphans decided to boycott the wallowing exercise apart from Garzi, Kalama and Kanjoro who decided to have fun in the water.  

In the afternoon, the orphans settled to browse west of Ithumba Hill and in the evening they all returned back safely to the stockades. 

It was a cold and quiet morning. The orphans left the stockades soon after the morning milk feed and headed straight out to browse. Kamok settled to feed with Ambo and Musiara and perhaps was guiding them on how to be good babies, because although she is quite naughty she is very good with younger elephants! Ambo and Musiara have been chosen to keep the new babies, which will be coming from Nairobi soon, company. We are so excited to receive more babies from the Nursery, and they will remember Musiara, Ambo, Jotto, Sattao, Dololo and others from the Nursery too! 

Maramoja and Mundusi were engaged in a deep conversation; perhaps as Mundusi wanted to know from Maramoja why she and Enkikwe had been moved up to the next class. The Keepers know the move was both to make room for the new arrivals and also because Mundusi has been a trouble maker recently, and has been verbally warned by the Keepers several times! Maramoja didn’t want to stay talking with Mundusi for long as they were supposed to be seriously tucking into browsing to avoid going back home without enough to eat. Later, Musiara joined his friend Maramoja and they walked slowly together as they concentrated on browsing. 

Mutara, Kainuk, Suguta, Sities, Turkwel, Orwa, Kithaka, Garzi, Lemoyian, Kalama, Melia, Chemi Chemi and Kibo joined the dependent orphans shortly before mud bath time. The herd walked to the mud bath together where Lemoyian engaged Tusuja in a pushing game while Wanjala played with Kuishi. Garzi couldn’t stand seeing Wanjala pushing the little girl Kuishi. Garzi confronted Wanjala and demanded an explanation why he would pick on someone like Kuishi instead of someone his own size. Wanjala sensed trouble and decided the best thing to do was to turn and run away from Garzi. In the evening, two wild bulls joined Mutara’s herd at the stockade water troughs. Later, Kilaguni emerged from the south east and joined his friends.