A tale from the elephant corridors of Sri Lanka
Gayathri Samarakoon, an Australian-based Sri Lankan-born journalist, sent us this report on her visit to an elephant orphanage in her home country …
Leela, the baby elephant, was found swaying back and forth under a Mana tree next to the still corpse of her mother, bearing a gunshot wound on the right leg. Responding to distressed ‘braying’ issued by the recently orphaned Leela, two officers from the Wild Life Department had neared the cluster of trees outside the Conservation Park to investigate the ‘racket’ to find the baby elephant next to her mother.
Not more than three months of age, the baby elephant with soft pink trunk, darkened eyes and tuft of virgin hair sprouting atop had spurred the alarmed officers in to action as they had signalled for a rescue van to transport Leela to Elephant Transit Home (ETH) in Udawalawe, Sri Lanka.
Her initial stay at the orphanage was characterised by constant swaying, braying and restlessness which had the doctors and the mahouts at the ETH concerned for weeks.
Taking time to adjust to her new home inhabited by 32 other orphans in similar motherless situations, Leela as the youngest had become a source of attraction and concern among the carers and visitors.
“Only consolation was that she took in her six packets of milk without much protest,” said the officer in charge at the feeding grounds, explaining that all the babies were entitled to six packets of milk until they came to rely on vegetation.
Then, last week at feeding time, much to the delight of many, Leela had retaliated, playfully hurling a ball of dust at senior Seela, at four years who’d been in front of the queue. This was a sure sign of interaction, indicating recovery from her ordeal, surmised the officers from the viewing platform which had been erected at a safe distance from the feeding enclosure, allowing glimpses of the orphans to visitors and ‘surrogate parents’ who have adopted the elephants.
EHT, formed in 1995 for orphans such as Leela, has seen to the protection, nurturing and rehabilitation of hundreds of young elephants who would eventually be released to their natural habitat at the age of four when better able to fend for themselves.
Yala, Udawalawe and Badulla are some of the Conservation Parks they are released to, with a radio collar which would come off in two years after assurance of their survival in the wild.
Much the same way a kangaroo, however adorable, becomes a pest causing havoc on highways, the elephant poses a threat to country farmers, destroying harvest and sometimes killing them, refuelling the elephant/man conflict in Asia — and sometimes also leading to the abandonment of little Leelas in the wild, which in turn pulls the protective chords of humans who honour their protective instincts by coming to the rescue of the innocent, restoring faith in humanity.
Thus continues the cycle …
To adopt a baby elephant go to http://www.bornfree.org.uk/elefriends/eth/visit.shtml
PICTURE: Feeding time at an elephant orphanage in Sri Lanka.
May 14th, 2006 at 4:52 pm
Very interesting Article; thouroughly enjoyed reading it!