What to do around Elephants

[susanenslin]

Hi,

Thanks for everybody’s great advise and links to more information.
Counting down the days!

[squirrel_asc]

You've received good advice so far...

IMO, the most important thing is to learn to read the Elephants' body language as others have explained, and to respect the amount of space they want.

Just like you and I have a bubble of "personal space" around us, so do elephants (Theirs is just a lot bigger then ours!). The ones in the North tend to have bigger "bubbles" than the ones in the South. They will very clearly show you when you are getting to close, and as long as you can understand their signals and respect them, you're fine.

Enjoy your trip!

[Mischief]

Welcome susanenslin to the Forum.

You have been given excellent advice about personal space for Ellies. Of course common sense playa a big role as well. Do enjoy your trip in March which is just around the corner
now.

It would be great to give us some feedback about your trip....particularly the elephant encounters

viewforum.php?f=27...this is Travel Tales. Not necessary to do a long lengthy report, maybe just a synopsis of your trip and pictures are not obligatory but your choice to add or not.

Have Fun!

[Melaka]

This post makes interesting and informative reading. Our experience is that elephants display a wide variety of behaviour. Mostly, even with young, they seem quite well habituated to cars provided one is sensible. On a couple of occasions we've seen herds on an apparent rampage for no obvious reason. The first was in open country and we were happy to be able to watch from the side as one certainly wouldn't have wanted to be in front of it! The second was in thicker country near Sirheni, again from the side, but as it was quite close we deemed a modest retreat to be a sensible precaution.

A more interesting dilemma was a medium sized animal on a dirt road. He did not look in good health and was standing at right angles to the road rocking to and fro. As he rocked forward his tusks projected well over the road but were clear when he rocked back. We watched this for about fifteen minutes before deciding that it would be safe to pass on a backward rock. We did so and he showed no sign of concern.

[BCUG]

All very interesting reading . we have been to Addo for 4 years running at the end of our garden route meander planning a big Kruger trip next year. The Ellies in Addo seem much more relaxed and used to cars I think, Certainly around some of the waterholes. where hundreds gathered for a daily chat and the youngsters playing!! they literally brushed against our cars. loved seeing them gently avoid the little tortoises. cannot wait for Kruger. Still in the planning stage though, and enjoying these forums

[Elsa]

After our recent 25 day trip in Kruger, apart from seeing far fewer ellies than usual, could be down to the extremely thick vegetation, we actually found that the ones we did see were very relaxed and we didn't have one single time when we felt uncomfortable or even threatened.
One thought was that maybe they were all very happy ellies due to the abundant food and water available.

[Melaka]

On our trip in February we had one incident where we deemed it sensible to reverse a couple of hundred metres. It was on the S146 to Joubert's grave and the only animals we saw in the 37km there and back were ellies. Most were crossing the road but one large tusker, with only the right tusk, was walking right down the middle so we reversed until he turned off. It was more of a precaution than a response to a specific threat as we saw no signs of aggression. Like Elsa we saw fewer ellies than we'd expected. On a few days we saw none at all. Buffalo were even scarcer and we went several days without seeing any and in all there was only one decent herd - c50 - and a few small groups.