Elephant Encounter - amazing facts

Have you ever seen the inside of an elephant’s mouth, stood between its front legs or stroked its back and survived to tell the tale? I also studied the sole of an elephant’s foot (it has toenails). Did you know that elephants are matriarchal? That the moms raise the children and discipline them? Or even that teenage elephants need to remain with the herd to learn how to behave? Legendary elephant graveyards probably exist in muddy places where the grass is soft and easy to chew because elephants mostly die of hunger as their teeth are no longer able to chew.

Training Elephants

Elephant Whispers, Hazyview, South Africa, is one of many places where elephants are being saved, literally, from being killed. The seven elephants at Elephant Whispers were all "problem children". I had to think of Colonel Hati and his troupe in the Jungle Book when these great big elephants all obeyed a string of requests: turn right, turn around, walk forwards. Then we could each ask an elephant to do something, even my seven year old could ask Jabu to pick up a hat and he did! African elephants, as opposed to Indian elephants, were reputed to be untrainable! The elephants aren’t forced to do anything but are taught to link an action with language using tidbits as reward, neither are they linked to a single trainer. This was our introduction to the elephants, then we could actually touch one of the elephants called Thandi, which means beloved. The hide is very rough! We scrutinised the soles of her feet as she lay patiently while we also inspected her huge toenails. The sole looks much like the rest of the hide except that it can be contracted to walk easily in muddy conditions.