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The two orphans that will never run into their rooms without first passing Maxwell’s stockade in the evening are Ndiwa and Tamiyoi. They will usually first stop by Maxwell’s to grab some Lucerne pellets before proceeding to their rooms. As these two were busy collecting up some pellets yesterday afternoon, Malkia came charging up behind Ndiwa driving her towards her room. Tamiyoi ran away as Ndiwa yelled out causing lots of drama. Sagala was moved to a different room a few days ago to create space for the new baby, who we have called Dololo, and she still has to get used to her new room. She was very confused and ran around yelling. Sagala is a naturally shy and nervous elephant and it took the Keepers some time to calm her down as well. Eventually she, Ndiwa and Tamiyoi went into their stables and they all settled down. Maisha is becoming more like Malima during the public visiting time. Today a group of young orphans were playing in the mud bath when Maisha climbed out and started kicking a muddy football around. She started kicking it toward the visitors and charging around and their shouting encouraged her even more. Her trumpeting encouraged all the others to start running around as well and Emoli became very excitable, even charging towards the Keepers as they tried to calm everyone down.

The weather has been pretty hot for the orphans these past few days. This means that every time they come across a stream or have their milk feed by the mud bath, they will be sure to have a swim to cool themselves. Some of the orphans do not go straight into the water, but wait for others to go in first. Musiara is one who never hesitates and once he has made the decision to go swimming he will jump straight into the water. Today when the first group arrived at the mud bath for their noon milk feed, Tamiyoi walked straight over to the mud pool after her milk bottles. She tested the water but found it to be too cold and walked away. She was followed by Maisha, Enkesha, Sattao and Emoli who all walked away after testing the water temperature as well. As this was going on Kiasa and Musiara were feeding on the branches and Kiasa started fighting Musiara for a branch that he was chewing on. Emoli ran over to separate the two, at which point Musiara marched straight into the mud pool and starting playing. He was later joined by the others, with only Tamiyoi and Sattao deciding not to go in. Little Dololo came out of his stockade today to spent time in the forest near the compound with Luggard and Merru. He did very well and enjoyed his day out.

Recently, after the public visiting hour, all the orphans have had the opportunity to spend some time with the new arrivals Merru and Dololo and Luggard too, before walking off deep into the forest and leaving these three to browse together closer to the compound. During this period of time today, when Tamiyoi’s younger group arrived, Dololo was sleeping. This is because sometimes he doesn’t sleep well at night, and this makes him tired so he is allowed to take naps during the day if he wants. Because Dololo was sleeping Tamiyoi’s group just decided to carry on browsing, and give him the space to rest. This wasn’t quite the case when the older orphans arrived! Ndiwa, Sana Sana, Sagala, Malkia and Tagwa all went in search of the three babies to find out what they were doing. Eventually Tagwa, Ndiwa and Sagala moved on to browse with Tamiyoi’s group but Malkia and Sana Sana stayed behind. Malkia went over to where Dololo was napping and tried to wake him up by gently tapping him with her foot. This annoyed Sana Sana however and she tried to push Malkia away but she wouldn’t listen. Eventually she charged at her to push her away from the sleeping Dololo, and when Malkia left she lay down next to Dololo and rested her trunk on him, gently patting him while he slept.

Yesterday evening the Keepers were battling with Emoli and trying to get him to move to a grown up stockade. It was time for him to move really and they were also trying to make space for a new baby. Emoli didn’t want to be moved from his stable however. He gave the Keepers more hassle than his friend Maisha has ever done; she has always changed rooms easily and with understanding. In the middle of the night the new little calf we rescued from near Ithumba, along the Tiva River, became very unsettled and was trying to join Dololo next door and climb over the partition. Sattao’s peaceful night was cut short as it was thought he and the new little calf should swap rooms. Later in the day and after all the drama of the night, the orphans had quite a fun afternoon as they decided to enjoy a lengthy mud bath. Sattao, who does not normally enjoy such mud baths, was actually the star swimmer today. Musiara is such a soft and gentle little boy but perhaps because of his size and character he always keeps falling into fights with Kiasa, and Maktao as well sometimes. His arguments with Kiasa are understandable, because she is a naughty little girl, but we are not sure why his fights arise with Maktao. Like many occasions before, today Tamiyoi and Enkesha had to step in to save Musiara from a fight.

Since the arrival of little Merru and Dololo, Musiara has been spending more time away from his long-term friend Luggard. This is because Luggard keeps the new little ones company in the forest during the day, while they still cannot walk as far as the others. When the two friends and neighbours wake up in the morning, they want to spend as much time as possible together, and spend it well before they have to part ways in the forest. This morning they walked side by side as they walked out of the compound and into the bush. Arriving out they spent some time engaged in a friendly wrestling game. Jotto and Ambo tried to interrupt their game as they also wanted to play. Musiara went to join Tagwa and Malkia who were feeding nearby, and Luggard just walked away. Ambo and Jotto were just left there and decided to start a game of their own, until Jotto, who also likes playing with Luggard, left Ambo to follow after Luggard. It was close to the milk feeding time, so Luggard wasn’t interested in playing with Jotto and just carried on walking towards where he knows the milk feed takes place. Sometimes Maisha can be a bit of a bully, but only when she is in a really bad mood and only really towards Sattao and Musiara. Today Sattao was drinking some water from the trough and for no reason at all she went over and head-butted him. She didn’t even want any water, and Sattao cried out for help so Enkesha came over to assist him and Maisha ran away. She just seemed to be in a bad mood today with the two little boys!

Luggard is forming his very own little herd, as he enjoys spending most of the day with the little ones Dololo, Merru and Mukoka. Merru seems to look up to Dololo but Dololo is not very nice back. Luggard is gentle and loving towards all of them. Mukoka is settling in so well and enjoying his new surroundings and friends. It’s only at the start of the day in the early morning hours that these four are away from the rest of the herd; after the 9am milk feed Merru and Mukoka join the main herd whilst Luggard stays back to keep Dololo company as he is still quite weak and walks slower than the others. Later on Luggard joined the main herd as well and Dololo stayed back with his Keeper. Mukoka behaved very well with the older herd and followed the big girls everywhere. It was still too soon for him to attend the public visit today however, so during that one hour he and Luggard walked back to where Dololo was. When Kiko joined the elephants out in the forest today, there were wild giraffe’s browsing close to the elephants. When they saw Kiko walking towards the elephants, they tried to approach him, but he kept walking away from them and keeping close to his elephant family. Now Sagala, Kuishi and Maisha have got used to their new rooms which they return to in the evening. Emoli however is still causing trouble for the Keepers to go into his new room at night. Today he fought so hard in the evening to go into his old room, but it has now been taken by Mukoka so he has to get used to his new room eventually!

The orphans are very good at telling the time – they know when it is time to go back home for bed, milk feeding time or time to go out to the forest. They are very used to their routine! This morning however, for one reason or another, there was some delay for them to come out of their rooms. Emoli is a very outgoing young bull and when he was absolutely sure it was well past their time to leave for the forest he started yelling and shouting, complaining about the delay. As soon as some of the others started coming out of their rooms, he started celebrating and trumpeting, running towards the forest in glee. Mapia and Sagala joined him in his celebration and ran trumpeting after him. Tagwa didn’t want to accompany the others before seeing Dololo, Merru and Mukoka. She went around head butting doors and banging the milk buckets to their rooms – we are not sure if she was just playing or expressing how she felt. Whenever she was encouraged in the direction of the forest, she just kept coming back and doing the same thing. It was not until the three babies were let out that she escorted them out to the forest to join the others. Jotto gets on with everyone in the family, but we do not often find him engaged in games with Kuishi. Today we watched on as these two were engaged in a friendly wrestling game for a very long time. Kuishi takes the games very seriously and is very tough, especially towards the boys, and she does not like to give in easily!

Tamiyoi is a very clever girl and we all know that! She knows that the new arrivals get extra vegetation and nourishment to help them get back to health and good condition. When the others are coming out of their rooms in the morning and gather outside the stockades to wait for one another, Tamiyoi never goes straight out to the forest. She will always move towards Merru, Mukoka and then Dololo’s stables to feed on their leftovers! The Keepers try to keep an eye on her but she always makes sure to hide and get access to at least some of these rooms to find those tasty treats. Maisha and Musiara are very sweet and are trying to make friends with little Merru. Musiara always tries to avoid Maisha at the same time though, because she sometimes likes to bully him. Today for a long period of time however, these two accompanied the little boy. Jotto later took over from them and he walked over and started hugging the little boy. Jotto is so kind to the little ones; when Merru started to follow him he began breaking branches and dropping them on the ground as the leaves were too high for little Merru to reach. He was being such a kind older friend to the little bull.