A ranger stayed with her that first night but I was up every couple of hours to check on her and to monitor the fence, panicking that if the herd realized she was with us, they might crash through it to get her. If they wanted their calf back, nothing would stop them, not even 8,000 volts.
But they didn’t come for her that night. They ambled up to the house a few days later and spent the entire morning calmly grazing along the fence. We kept expecting them to become agitated and to show some sign that they wanted their crippled infant back.
Lawrence eventually rubbed his shirt and hands over the calf and went up to them, palms outstretched, to ‘tell’ them that she was safe. Nana, Frankie and Nandi’s heads shot up and their trunks writhed between the electrified strands towards him. I stood on the veranda, more than a bit nervous. Their trunks quivered all over his hands, scenting the calf, then, far from being distressed, they looked reassured and left as serenely as they had arrived.
Lawrence walked back to me, slipped his hand into mine and we watched them leave. We were family, the elephants and us, and they had just entrusted their calf to us. Words can’t describe how moved we were, and how responsible we felt for her survival.
‘We’ll call her Thula,’ I murmured.
Lawrence nodded and squeezed my hand. ‘She’s going to be fine.’
The vet was upbeat and felt confident that with daily home ‘physio’ we would slowly be able to move her feet into the right position in the hope that she would learn to walk. By morning, Thula had gobbled up an entire bottle of her formula. I was so happy for her, and so encouraged, because baby elephants are notoriously difficult to feed, even when they’re really hungry. Their head and trunk tip instinctively to search for their mother’s body and they need to feel secure before they will drink. We helped her along by hanging up a heavy piece of rough sacking – to mimic her mum’s skin – and gave her the bottle from behind it.
Every day, she had ‘walk therapy’ and even though it was obviously painful for her to use her feet, she was determined to try.
By day three, she managed a few paces – very unstable and unsure but she did it. We were so excited, cheering her on and clapping at her achievement. She looked very pleased with herself. Before the end of that first week, she tottered across the lawn without help. I burst into tears. She was so gutsy and seemed thrilled by each of her milestones.
She and Biyela, our gardener, adored each other and spent hours outside together, with him gallantly protecting her baby skin from the sun with a huge golf umbrella. It was such a happy sight to see old Biyela and little Thula strolling across the lawn side by side.
She loved the umbrella and would sneak up behind him and curl her trunk around the handle and try to snatch it from him. Our sweet gardener would gamely launch into a tug-of-war with her, resulting in many broken umbrellas. But I didn’t care. There were plenty more where they came from and I wanted to do everything I could to keep that impish gleam in her eyes.
Everyone wanted to help, and within days she had her own foster herd of humans around her. Emotional well-being and physical health go hand in hand for these helpless creatures and love is as critical to their survival as any medicine a vet could prescribe.
Her feet became stronger and stronger, and before long, she was scampering everywhere like a boisterous toddler. She became my shadow, more puppy than elephant, and there wasn’t a thing in the house that little trunk of hers didn’t touch.
She was fascinated by the long thing growing out of her face and flopped it about chaotically until she learned a bit more control over it and promptly set about destroying my decor.
One day, she knocked over a stool. She gazed at it in confusion then tried to walk over it but her legs were too uncoordinated and she broke it. Delighted with her new toys, she picked up the pieces and flung them into the air. My poor home. Newborn elephants don’t usually master the use of their trunks that quickly, and whilst I was very proud of her, I quickly understood that it was safer to move any precious objects and breakables out of her reach.
She loved the kitchen, and even though she didn’t eat solids it didn’t stop her from sniffing every one of the ingredients I was using. Max and Tess, my Staffordshire bull terriers, stood by in total bewilderment. Why is she allowed to do that when we aren’t?
I was once cutting tomatoes and her trunk curled over the edge of the table and scooped up some of the pieces. I think the texture fascinated her, because she pushed those interesting red globs around the kitchen and created quite the Picasso artwork on the floor.
Max was right there, hoovering up the mess. He was never far from her and I was convinced that he thought she was part of his pack and knew she needed him to keep her safe.
Bijou and Tess were jealous of her and not at all happy about the way she had hijacked me away from them, but their possessiveness was mixed with motherliness because they too seemed to sense her fragility and often wandered into her room, sniffing and licking her face.
My home was quite an interesting hotchpotch of ‘children’ – a snobbish poodle, my two warrior staffies and a baby elephant. All living in perfect harmony.
Despite Thula’s size, she was surprisingly gentle with the dogs, especially Bijou, who often walked with her in the garden. Even with her wobbly legs, Thula never once trod on her by mistake. If only she had been as careful with my furniture!
Week one slipped into weeks two and three, and we began to relax. She was a long way off from being strong enough to keep up with a running herd, but I was confident she would get there.
Near the end of the fourth week, her carer ran into the kitchen.
‘Come quick! Thula can’t stand!’ he shouted.
I ran after him to her room. She tried to get up to greet me, squealing in pain and frustration that she couldn’t. I fell to my knees and held her in my arms.
The next day, she refused her bottle.
The vet didn’t know what to do. We phoned every expert we knew but no one could help. We had no idea what was wrong with her. It seemed as if her joints were sore and any movement made it worse. She became listless and barely able to lift her head.
We took it in turns to be with her, to stroke her, to tell her how brave she was and how much we loved her. I told her that her mother Nandi was waiting for her and that the whole herd were excited about the day she would be back with them. I don’t know if she understood but Lawrence always believed animals understood emotion so I kept talking to her.
Back onto the drip she went. Nothing helped. She deteriorated before my eyes. It happened so unbelievably quickly.
Biyela came to the door every morning, umbrella in hand and hope on his face. I couldn’t speak and just shook my head at him.
Our baby girl didn’t make it.
Lawrence woke me up before sunrise exactly four weeks after she was born and told me she was gone. I couldn’t believe it. How could she be gone? Just a week ago, I was chasing her through the house to get my sun hat back.
I was broken. We all were. I cried and cried. I had been so confident that she had made it through the worst. I never realized how much I loved her until she died. Her death was such a shock. Yes, she hadn’t been well for a few days, but she had been thriving the week before, and it never occurred to me that she wouldn’t bounce back.
She was such an optimistic and brave bundle of joy and I thought she would be with us forever. They were dark days, my sorrow was so deep, and it took me a long time to recover. Even now, years later, I choke up at the thought of her. Some creatures never leave your heart and she’s still in mine, that brave little Thula.
9
Long live the king
Nandi fell pregnant again almost immediately after losing Thula, and after a long pregnancy she gave birth to a very healthy boy calf, Shaka. I was so excited and relieved when Vusi told me he was walking within hours of being born. Once you’ve been through the trauma of not being able to save a very sick creature, the fear never leaves
you that it will happen again.
Happily, every baby born since then has been healthy, and so here I was in 2012, six years and twelve robust calves later, trying to find a way to appease the authorities who were still pressurizing me about our elephant-to-land ratio. I was doing my best to look for solutions but I was also very determined that nothing we did would disrupt their peaceful existence.
I asked Mike Toft for advice on controlling numbers in a way that didn’t involve culling or breaking up the herd.
‘There is something I’ve been investigating for a while but I won’t get your hopes up yet because I need to do some more research first. How much time have they given you?’ he asked.
‘They didn’t say,’ I replied. ‘And I’d rather not ask. The next time I contact them, I want to be able to show them that we’re doing everything we can to address the problem.’
‘I’ll get back to you as soon as I can,’ he promised.
He didn’t elaborate but I felt hopeful. I found it really hard to accept that 4,500 hectares wasn’t enough for our herd. We often went for weeks on end without seeing them at all, not even when the rangers went looking for them, so how could our reserve not be big enough? I still had so much to learn about conservation.
Strangely, during that period the elephants visited the house almost every day. Did they know their fate was being decided? Were they reminding me that we were part of the same big family? I didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. I loved seeing them so often and having their calming presence so near to me.
Sometimes one of the calves would walk up to a game drive vehicle and Nana would immediately bustle up to it and stop it from getting too close. The calf would be allowed a mock charge or two for practice, swivelling its head and flinging its tiny trunk about, but then she would gently nudge it away. Rules are rules and cars were out of bounds. Lawrence would have been proud of her. He always wanted the herd to be truly wild and never get too accustomed to being around humans.
The adult females have an endless supply of patience and I’ve never seen any of them lose their temper with one of the babies, and believe me, they can be as much of a handful as human kids! They’re curious and have too much energy for their own good.
It’s one of the reasons Lawrence and I rescued Gobisa. After Mnumzane died, the younger bulls were unmanageable. In the wild, they would have had an alpha male to teach them manners and without Mnumzane, they ran riot. Mabula was our oldest bull but at eighteen years old, he was far too young and irresponsible to take over.
‘We need an adult bull to take charge of them,’ Lawrence said. ‘Especially Mabula. He’s inherited his mother’s bolshie attitude and he’s getting too big for his boots. Without an alpha male to keep him in check, he could end up being a real problem for us when he’s older.’
The role of dominant bull generally goes to an adult male in his thirties and while it isn’t a leadership position like the matriarch’s, he is crucial for controlling teenage bulls and for passing on strong healthy genes, because he usually gets the pick of the females when they go into oestrus.
One afternoon, Promise and a second ranger Siya were on a game drive with a Land Cruiser full of guests. They had seen very few animals and the guests were getting restless, so Promise was taking them to see our hippos, Romeo and Juliet. A few minutes from the dam, they drove around a corner and there was the herd, right in the road. Promise slowed to a stop and smiled at the guests.
‘Here they are,’ he grinned, feeling quite smug that he had found them after all.
Mabula spun towards them the minute he heard the vehicle arrive.
‘That’s Frankie’s son,’ Promise explained.
Mabula lifted his giant head and gave an annoyed trumpet. The guests were delighted and clicked madly with their cameras. He began to trot towards them. Promise shifted into reverse but stayed put. Mabula sped up, trunk swinging from side to side.
‘It’s just a mock charge,’ Promise said calmly. ‘Stay seated and don’t panic.’
Mabula stampeded towards them, followed by two other young bulls. Promise began to reverse slowly. Mabula didn’t slow down. Siya scrambled out of his tracker’s seat and into the 4×4.
‘Eish, wena!’ he yelled at Mabula.
Promise had his foot flat on the accelerator. There was dust everywhere and still Mabula kept charging. Promise and Siya hammered the side of the 4×4 with their hands and shouted at Mabula to back off. Our teenager wasn’t taking orders and knocked the Land Cruiser with his tusks. If the guests had been bored earlier, they were now getting enough adrenalin to last them a lifetime.
Thanks to Promise’s level-headedness and Formula One reversing, Mabula lost interest, but when he tried the same trick a fortnight later, Lawrence was concerned.
‘If we don’t get a father figure for him, he’s going to take this charging nonsense too far.’
He made some calls and after a lot of to-ing and fro-ing with the authorities, Gobisa arrived, a powerful bull in his mid-thirties. I took one look at him and wondered how Mabula would react.
‘He’s huge,’ I said to Lawrence. ‘What if Mabula doesn’t listen to him?’
‘Gobisa will batter him into submission,’ he shrugged. ‘It’s the way it has to be.’
Except Gobisa had no intention of staying.
Just before midnight on his first day, we were woken to the news that he had smashed through the 8,000-volt boma fence. Lawrence radioed for support, kissed me goodbye and flew out the door. I sat by the phone on tenterhooks, reliving the drama of Nana’s breakouts ten years earlier. What a nightmare. Lawrence kept me posted as he tracked Gobisa’s path of destruction.
‘We wanted a boss man and we got one,’ he said. ‘He’s heading back to where he came from, broken through six electric fences and he’s still going. We’ve got two choppers looking for him and Dave Cooper’s got trucks and a crane on standby.’
‘Be careful, Lolo,’ I said. ‘I want both of you back in one piece.’
‘Roger that, Frankie,’ he replied, his grin coming down the phone line.
A team of seventeen men in two helicopters and several 4×4s hunted the area for Gobisa, and when they found him he put up one hell of a fight. Nothing frightened him, not even the racket of the helicopter that tried to chase him out of the dense bush where he was hiding. It crossed my mind that we might be getting more elephant than we had bargained for.
‘He’s taken cover in the ravine,’ Lawrence reported to me. ‘It’s now or never. If we don’t get him, the authorities will shoot him.’
I knew exactly which ravine he was talking about. A long narrow gorge with minimal access. If Gobisa went in too far, neither helicopter nor 4×4 would be able to get anywhere close to him.
‘How on earth are you going to save him now?’ I asked.
‘There’s one open area that’s our last chance … if they can dart him there, we can get him out. If not…’
‘Don’t take any risks,’ I begged.
Half the day went by without news and my imagination went into overdrive. Not only had Gobisa disappeared into the ravine, but Lawrence had followed him and been injured and no one wanted to tell me. I was desperate to phone. But if they were in the middle of a rescue, the last thing they needed was a panicked call from me.
One of the longest days of my life later, my phone rang at last.
‘We got him back,’ Lawrence said, exhaustion in every word.
‘Thank God you’re okay,’ I groaned.
‘Bad news is the bastard got out of the boma again and has run off in the direction of the perimeter fence.’
‘What?’
‘Smashed right through the boma’s 8,000 volts. I saw it with my own eyes. This is one mother of an elephant, Frankie.’
‘Come home, chéri. You’ve been going for twenty-four hours. You need rest.’
‘I need my elephant back,’ he grunted. ‘Can’t give up on the bugger now.’
Maybe it was the effect of the
multiple doses of sedatives that Gobisa had been given when the men had brought him back the first time, or maybe it was pure exhaustion, but he didn’t break out of the actual reserve. Instead, he disappeared into the undergrowth and hid. We had no way of knowing where, but the fact that there were no breaches in the fence meant he was still inside Thula Thula. It saved his life. Had he escaped again, the authorities would have shot him. Human lives and property were at stake and no one was cutting an enraged six-ton bull any slack.
Lawrence got hold of Gobisa’s owners to tell them what had happened and to ask their advice. They were shocked and promised to send a man Gobisa knew well to help settle him in. At that point, Lawrence had his doubts that anyone could help but we were desperate and he was prepared to try anything.
‘Send him,’ he said. ‘I need all the input I can get.’
Ndlovu arrived the next morning, a wiry Zulu with glittering eyes and a solemn manner. He and Lawrence immediately went out in the Land Rover to look for Gobisa.
‘He’s close. I can feel him,’ Ndlovu murmured. ‘He’s hiding in the shadow of hills, in a forest near an old riverbed.’
Lawrence was dumbfounded. Ndlovu had described the exact location where they had last spotted Gobisa.
‘How do you know?’ he asked.
‘His spirit reaches me and mine reaches him. We will wait.’
It had been days since Lawrence or the rangers had set eyes on Gobisa but the morning after Ndlovu arrived, he came out of hiding.
‘I told you he knew I was here,’ Ndlovu smiled.
‘What do we do?’
‘We wait.’
Lawrence and he sat in the Land Rover and watched Gobisa make his way towards them. Lawrence stiffened as Gobisa walked straight up to the 4×4. He had seen the destruction this enormous beast was capable of. Gobisa silently circled them then disappeared again.
An Elephant in My Kitchen: What the Herd Taught Me About Love, Courage, and Survival Page 8