Encountering elephants on Mt Elgon, Kenya; rumbling to reassure them, then one hides behind a tree!

The elephants of Mt Elgon are unique - they visit caves, feeling their way deep underground to mine the sodium-rich rock. This means that they grind down their tusks faster than they can grow, and most have stumpy little stubs like the females in this video crossing the road in Mt Elgon National Park, Kenya. You can hear me rumbling to reassure them - seems to work as they gently go on their way. Then a couple of males emerge, first a young one backwards (only he knows why) and displays a bit, then Big Tembo stands tall, named by the MEEM Team (the Mt Elgon Elephant Monitoring Team I set up in 2001) because he reminded them of an elephant on bottles of Kenyan beer. He was an adult male with unusually long tusks for an Elgon ele. I just came across this mini-DV video which dates back to 2002 and is now rather poignant because Big Tembo was shot by ivory poachers in January 2019, ironically just days after China closed its domestic ivory markets.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=3190529174306208&set=pb.100000474691318.-2207520000..&type=3
So important to make carved ivory a symbol of shame rather than status.
So important to realise the true value of #elephants as
#GardenersoftheForest - see www.Rebalance.Earth
#IvoryBelongstoElephants
Visit the Elgon caves virtually via https://www.vecotourism.org/news/take-a-tour/salt-mining-elephants-of-mount-elgon/
Keep up with conservation and research on Mt Elgon via Mount Elgon Foundation https://mountelgonfoundation.org.uk/

Видео Encountering elephants on Mt Elgon, Kenya; rumbling to reassure them, then one hides behind a tree! канала Ian Redmond