Conservation of Wildlife in the Luangwa Valley

Orphaned elephant move

Chodoba's move and Chamilandu's pending move.

Chodoba (something that has been lost and found in the local language Nyanja).

Chodoba is a young male elephant close to three years old who was found wandering alone near a camp for nearly six weeks. I took a great interest in him and monitored his deterioration for more than three weeks in the hope that he would be taken in by other elephants. Although many were around on a regular basis, neither Chodoba nor any of the other elephants took any interest in each other. October in Luangwa is a harsh time for animals anyway and Chodoba was becoming increasingly thin day by day, so once his ribs started poking out I thought I had to get involved.

Some would ask why? We lose many elephants every year to poaching and some suffer slow and painful deaths from wire snares. So why not? I have personally darted and treated more than thirty five snared elephants over the past two years and have been present and helped the Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA) to make decisions to euthanaze (by shooting) a number of elephants injured by gun shots.

So began the capture and care of Chodoba for the next couple of weeks.

With the full support of ZAWA, we darted and moved Chodoba from the area around Flatdog's Camp to Chipembele Wildlife Education Centre, where good friends Anna and Steve Tolan agreed to take him in for a few weeks to try and fatten him up. At first we thought he might have something wrong with him as he was so lethargic and weak, but soon realized this was totally due to his poor condition and lack of nutrition.

The decision to take Chodoba in to our custody was carefully planned and thought out. The David Shepherd Foundation has recently established an elephant orphanage in Kafue National Park, to help with the reintroduction of a six year old elephant called Phoenix. The plan was to take Chodoba to Kafue as soon as possible to join Phoenix and another young elephant from Lower Zambezi called Zamma.

Due to Chodoba's size he could not be flown so we made the decision to drive him there in our modified land cruiser. The trip took us thirty hours with a number of stops for feeding, watering him and tranquilizer top ups. The team consisted of Moffat Phiri and I from SLCS and James Milanzi (ZAWA Ecologist) and Ison Simwanza from ZAWA. We took turns driving through the night and arrived about twelve hours later than we anticipated. Chodoba handled the journey extremely well and on reaching Kafue, he calmly stepped off the vehicle into his new home and started feeding.

He has not stopped since and we hope that in the next few months he will put on weight and become strong again. He is being monitored by keepers from the David Shepherd Foundation and human contact is being kept to a minimum, with the focus being on contact with Zamma and Phoenix.

The cost of Chodoba's move was minimal and literally cost us fuel to and from Kafue National Park, so overall it was a success.

Chamilandu

As luck would have it, the day before we are due to leave for Kafue we received a report of a wounded elephant cow with a young calf at Chamilandu camp inside the park. After going down to check on the elephant we found her in a terrible state, emaciated, in agony with a hugely swollen and infected leg and hardly able to move. The wound appeared to be from a gunshot.

In a case like this the decision is normally straight forward and the elephant should be euthanazed. However, she had a young calf that was not yet weaned and could not possibly survive alone. If the decision is made to shoot the mother, the calf is our responsibility. The Kafue trip was postponed for a day, and we made arrangements to have milk formula donated and sent up by the David Shepherd Foundation. The following day we drove to the camp and a ZAWA scout shot the mother. The ordeal for the mother was over in seconds but only just beginning for the calf.

Chamilandu was then tranquilized for her two hour journey to Chipembele. She was put in to a separate boma for the night and frantically tried to get out and screamed the whole night. She was obviously terrified and lost without her mother. The second night saw improvement and she had calmed down and was drinking milk without problems.

She is now on thirty litres per day and in good health. Chamilandu needs to be moved to Kafue as soon as possible to join up with her new family, Phoenix, Chodoba and Zamma. We are planning on flying her there as she is still small enough and a journey of thirty hours may take its toll.

We'll keep you updated over the next couple of weeks.

Best wishes, Rachel (CEO SLCS).

Getting ready for the long trip

On the way. One of many stops to feed

30 hrs later. Finally there.

Finding his way around in in his new home.

Emaciated mother with swollen leg and alongside her, Chamilandu, her calf.

After the shooting and the capture of the calf.

Where are we? View a map...