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We came across this little orphaned elephant calf on a recent visit to Kruger National Park, R.S.A.. She was only several days old and was wandering aimlessly on one of the parks roads. Her mother and the herd were no where in sight. In short order, she was surrounded by a mass of 15-30 vehicles, everyone wanted a picture of this sad but cute baby. As we sat there looking at her and wondering what her fate may be and wishing we could help somehow, we also knew that if her mother came crashing through the nearby shrubs, we could likely be reduced to scrap metal and toe jam! After about 10 minutes, we decided to carry on with our sight seeing. We were saddened by this little one's plight though.

This story made the headlines the following day in the local "Lowvelder" newspaper. Apparently some brave tourists eventually broke park rules and exited their vehicles to pour water over the baby elephant in an attempt to cool her down. After several hours of waiting for help in the heat of the day, she was finally taken to the Skukuza camp to be seen by a vet. She was declared "too weak...", and "a danger to herself and to humans" and therefore was euthanized. According to the an elephant researcher with KNP who had been on staff for 37 years, this was only about the 3rd such case he had seen. It is extremely rare for an elephant calf to be orphaned and entirely abandoned like this. I suppose the rest of the story will never be told.