Sheldrick Wildlife Trust
The Sheldrick Wildlife Trust was established in 1977 to honor the memory of naturalist and conservationist David Sheldrick, the founding Warden of Tsavo East National Park, where he worked from 1948-1976. Although he died only 6 months after establishing the Wildlife Conservation and Management Department, his legacy of the management of Tsavo and wildlife in general, particularly in Kenya, lives on.
While at Tsavo, David Sheldrick and his wife Daphne, started looking after elephant orphans. Through a lot of trial and error, Dr. Dame Daphne Sheldrick was able to come up with a special milk formula and was successful in keeping a newborn orphan alive during its first 6 months. Many orphaned elephants have been given a second chance of a life in the wild due to the diligence of the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust.
Currently, the young orphans are taken to the nursery just outside Nairobi where they are raised until they are able to transition to the unit at Tsavo National Park. These orphans at their own pace, transition into a wild elephant community where they live free. Many of these once orphans, return with their wild born babies to the unit to visit the elephants which are still keeper dependent.
I first learned about the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust after I returned from my first trip to Africa in 2009. As this trip was part of a tour, our itinerary was fixed, so we did not visit the elephant orphanage in Nairobi. When I heard about it and the wonderful work they did, I was truly disappointed because we were actually visiting other sites in the immediate area. In researching my solo trip in 2010, I met a woman on-line via Tripadvisor. She mentioned she had adopted an elephant and had planned to visit it on her trip. I continued to read about others who had visited the orphanage and found it “magical”. At that point, I decided to adopt an ‘ellie’ and was determined to visit it on my next trip.
As a present to myself for my 60th birthday, I adopted Kithaka. Kithaka was orphaned during the morning of 20th November, 2011, as a tiny newborn male calf apparently left by his mother when she and her herd were chased out of an area of human settlement near the Ruiri outpost in the lower Imenti Forest. The calf wandered into an adjacent village searching for company from whence Kenya Wildlife Service Rangers rescued him. Due to the terrain and dense forest conditions, reuniting him with his herd would prove impossible, and so the Sheldrick elephant orphanage was contacted by the Senior Warden at Mount Kenya with the news of a rescue. The calf was transported to the Lewa airfield so that the baby could be airlifted from there to the Nairobi Nursery, arriving in torrential rain, well after dark. Kithaka was tiny, no more than, and possibly even less, than a week old on arrival, the hind side of the ears soft and petal pink and the umbilicus newly detached. His name is the Meru word for forest.
When I was setting up my trip for May, 2012, I made sure that visiting the elephant orphanage in Nairobi was Number 1 Priority. I wanted to attend not only the public viewing time of 11am-12n (and if you go, be sure to get there early as it can get very crowded) but also the special time for adoptive ‘parents’ from 5pm-6pm (if you are going at this time, you need to make a booking as they only allow a certain number of parents each day). The two visitation times were very different. During the public time, you get to see the elephants coming in from the nearby forested area with their keepers, being fed their bottles and hear an informative talk about each one and how they came to be rescued. At the evening visitation time, you get to see the elephants returning for the night, being fed, but the biggest thrill was to talk to the keepers and see the elephants up close in their individual sleeping quarters. It was such a warm experience watching little Kithaka being fed and then put to bed, being covered by a blanket. The keepers even sleep in the quarters with them for comfort.
Prior to my visit in March 2014, I adopted Kithaka’s pal at the orphanage, Barsilinga. Barsilinga was born in March 2012. His story, like all of the orphans at Sheldricks is a sad one. The evening of April 13, 2012, gunshots were heard by the community of the Lpus-La-Mpasion area near Wamba in the Samburu tribal area of Northern Kenya. The next morning a severely wounded female elephant, with a calf at foot, was spotted in the area. Bullet wounds to her chest area and front legs had rendered her barely able to even move, yet another victim of the ivory trade and a grizzly reminder of the suffering attached to each piece of ivory that is bought or sold. The mother’s end was a painful one, full of suffering, and her calf would have been a victim too had he not been one of the lucky few rescued. The matter was reported to a Kenyan Wildlife Service patrol within the area. They summoned the KWS Vet, Dr. Mutinda, who travelled to the scene to assess the injured mother. It turned out that the female elephant’s wounds were too severe for any hope of recovery. Having reported the matter to the Nairobi KWS Headquarters, it was decided that the mother be euthanized and her calf saved and sent to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust Elephant Nursery in Nairobi National Park. The calf had its last feed of mother’s milk at 9 a.m. before the mother was later laid to rest. By 1:30 p.m., the SWT Rescue Team landed at the nearby Kisima Airstrip and waited for the arrival of the KWS ground team with the young baby. KWS had a good distance to travel to bring the rescued calf to the closest airstrip and arrived about 30 minutes later with him loaded in the back of a landcruiser pickup, closely held by the rangers. After the SWT keepers checked on his condition he was loaded into the aircraft in order to be airlifted back to the Nursery, arriving in the afternoon.
It was wonderful to see little Kithaka and his buddy Barsilinga on my visit in 2012. It was even more wonderful to see both of them on my visits in 2014. They are success stories and have both grown into strong adolescents. It is enjoyable to watch their antics and receive monthly progress reports from the Trust. They have both done so well at the nursery in Nairobi… so well in fact that in late May, 2015, they were able to be moved to their Phase II transition area in Tsavo. Be well my boys!
And now a third. Yes, Africa has captured my heart. After my March and October 2014 trips, and not knowing how much longer my ‘boys’ Kithaka and Barsilinga might be at the orphanage (and clearly their typical male juvenile behavior was suggesting it was time for them to move to the next stage of rehabilitation) , I decided to adopt a little girl, Dupotto.
In August 2014, the local community found the elephant calf near a boma without her mother and alerted the Mara Elephant Project. The MEP team brought her to the airstrip for transporting to the Nairobi nursery. The reason for her being orphaned remains a mystery as a carcass had not been located in this area for over two months, and she could not have possibly survived that time without a mother at just five to six months old as a very much milk dependent calf.
She was named Dupotto after the area where she was found. Once she arrived at the Nairobi Nursery she settled and began feeding well from the outset, and very fortunately did not struggle to assimilate the new milk formula. Her road has been relatively smooth physically, but Dupotto’s scars are emotional ones. She has behaved very strangely, clearly suffering psychologically from events that befell her by being excessively restless and agitated. While she was part of the junior herd she fast became a disruptive member in the group. Then she discovered Embu, rescued four days before, an older orphan of approximately 18 months old who was retrieved from the forested slopes of Mount Kenya on the Embu side of the mountain by the Kenya Wildlife Service.
Dupotto immediately became emotionally dependent on Embu, sharing their grief both have been able to impart comfort and understanding to each other. To this day they remain firm friends.
I got to meet Dupotto on my visit in October, 2015. She was not a tiny gal like the boys were when I adopted them. She was looking quite healthy. And like the boys, she was somewhat naughty. Her idea of fun was to suck up water from her watering trough, wait until I got close to her pen, and then spray the water. I could see that coming and out-foxed her. Being a little older, she was less curious towards tourists than the tiny ones who love to stick their trunks up and be touched. She loved her mud baths with all the pushing and shoving.
When I returned to Nairobi in March, 2017, I was so happy to see Dupotto again. Judging from her behavior and size, I had a feeling she might be moved soon to the second stage of reintroduction to the wild. I was right. On Mother’s Day (May 14, 2017), Dupotto, along with her friends Kelelari and Karisa graduated to the Ithumba Relocation Unit. This is always bittersweet…. I will miss seeing her at the nursery but it is yet the next step to returning to the wild, where she belongs.
Knowing that Dupotto might be graduating soon and prior to my March 2017 trip, I wanted to make sure I had another youngster that would be at the nursery for a little while. ‘What’s another mouth to feed?’ I adopted Malkia which in Swahili means ‘Queen’. This seemed to be an appropriate choice since we called our past collie “The Queen”. Malkia was rescued from the Tsavo area in September, 2016. Her mother, a regal old lady, was found in poor health due to the severe drought, and collapsed with a young calf (of approximately 6 months in age) by her side. Despite the attempts from the members of the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust as well as the Kenyan Wildlife Service rangers to get her to her feet several times, her frail condition made this impossible. This old queen of the plains was humanely euthanized to save her the indignation and suffering of being torn apart by predators, while her milk dependent baby was rescued as night approached. She was kept temporarily at a nearby unit until she could be moved back to the nursery in Nairobi.
On my visit to the nursery in March 2017, I kept looking at the public visitation time, for a small elephant to be brought in with the other tiny ones. When I didn’t hear Malkia’s name announced, I asked Head Keeper Edwin, “where’s Malkia”. “Well, she will be along with the next group as she has been a little naughty and we need some of the little older ones to keep her in her place.” Obviously, I had made the right adoption choice, another naughty one. She definitely was a little more robust than I was expecting. But she had the sweetest personality. During the evening visit for adoptive ‘parents’, I spent a considerable amount of time by her “bedroom” after her evening bottle. Her curious trunk explored my hand and she came close to smell me. With her cute crinkled ears, she had the funniest expression on her face. I hope she remembers me on my next visit.
Since my first adoption (Kithaka), my elephant family has grown. Other adopted ellies have included Barsilinga, Dupotto, Malkia, Maktao, Roho and Bondeni. There are more about these elephants in My Elephant Chubbies section. Although I continue to support the Trust, just like human kids, they grow up, become independent and you have to ‘cut the cord’. Once they reach independence, I’ve not sponsored them but have adopted a younger one who resides at the orphanage in Nairobi that I’m most likely to see in person.
I cannot say enough good things about this organization. To see how happy the orphans were first hand and to speak with the keepers, who all seemed so glad to answer any questions and share how proud of the job they were doing, was a wonderful experience.
February 1, 2019, The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust was rebranded with a new name and logo to recognize the dedicated efforts of both David and Daphne Sheldrick. It is now called the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust.
For more information about the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, the various projects they undertake and the stories about the current elephants (and rhinos) available for adoption, go to http://sheldrickwildlifetrust.org.
