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Reteti: Elephant sanctuary in the wild north

Thursday May 25 2017
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A keeper pours soil on the youngest elephant calf. He will then wet the soil with water from a hosepipe to make mud that will act as a sunscreen. PHOTO | RUPI MANGAT

In a far-flung corner of northern Kenya, in the land of the Samburu people, is the majestic Mathews Range, which the local community calls Ol-doinyo Lenkiyieu.

We drive for 45 minutes on a red murram road — only four-wheel drive vehicles can make it in this terrain — through thorn bushes, waterless luggas and scattered homesteads at the base of the range.

We finally arrive at the Reteti Elephant Sanctuary for orphaned elephants run by the Samburu community operating as the Namunyak Conservancy under the umbrella of the Northern Rangelands Trust. There are nine elephant orphans and one black rhino calf.

We are escorted to a stockade where a one month-old elephant calf is being bottle-fed by Naomi Leshoro, the adoptive human mother. She is shielding the calf from the sun with an umbrella.

“We cannot take the little ones out for walks because it’s too hot for them,” says Amos Leleruk, the head of the keepers. Leleruk is an old hand at weaning orphaned elephants, having worked as an elephant keeper at the David Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage in Nairobi for 12 years.

“We started the conservancy in August 2016,” says Tom Letiwa, the sanctuary’s manager, “and got our first baby in December 2016.

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“Before, we used to take the calves to the elephant orphanage in Nairobi. But we decided that it was better for them to be looked after at home. We started with elephants orphans in Namunyak Conservancy, but now we take in all elephant orphans north of the Equator.

“We chose this remote area for the sanctuary because it’s far from human settlements which helps to avoid human wildlife conflict over water and pasture.”

Looking after orphans is not cheap. The calves are fed on a litre of powdered milk every three hours — a formula that Dame Daphne Sheldrick came up with in the 1970s when poaching was at its height, leaving many orphans in its wake.

A 14-kilometre water pipe keeps the waterhole full since the calves need a mudhole to bathe in and cool off.

A few minutes later, the older calves arrive from their walk, gulping down their milk and boisterously trooping to the waterhole.

There’s one who catches everyone’s attention. Rescued on November 10, 2016 near the Shaba National Reserve, she’s called Sheba. She’s the most playful and splashes water on everyone around her.

The keeper leads the smallest calf to the pool but it won’t step into the water. He sprays it with water using a hose pipe and then throws red soil over it with a spade.
The resulting mud acts as a sun screen. This is what elephant mothers in the wild do.

Funding for the sanctuary comes from the annual Safaricom Lewa Marathon, which takes place 70km south at the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy, which is also under the Northern Rangelands Trust.

“We’re united for elephants,” says Letiwa, “so the marathon is a really important fund raiser for our work.”

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