We had located a herd of elephants in the middle of the road on an early morning drive, and we rushed there to view them before they all crossed into some thick bush nearby. As we got closer, to our surprise, we realised that the elephants were not moving nor feeding. Instead, they were clustered together in one group with their heads bundled together in a circle, this was the first indication that this was going to be a very different elephant sighting.

As we sat and tried to figure out what was happening my tracker, Mike, whispered something to me that I was not expecting, he said one of the elephants is about to give birth and my guests and I couldn’t believe it. I have never seen an elephant give birth in my life... Yes, I have seen little calves maybe a few days old, but I have never had the opportunity to witness it happening. Female elephants only give birth every four to five years or so, and their gestation period is around 22 months, so this was going to be a very rare sighting, one never to be forgotten.

We witnessed the new calf dropping to the ground with the whole herd surrounding the mother in the middle trying to give her protection and secure the area to make it a safe environment for her and her new calf. The mother then sniffed and blew on the calf as if she was acknowledging and greeting her new baby.

It was incredible to see how the older female in the herd, possibly the matriarch, was leading the mother that had just given birth to lift the calf up. It seemed to us that the mother had no idea what to do, or was possibly exhausted, as the calf lay helplessly on the ground. The older female then started to pick the calf up herself and made it lean on her front legs until it got the strength to stand by itself.

As all this was happening, we then noticed that the mother of the calf picked up something that looked to be the afterbirth and started to eat it. Some of it she tossed around for a bit before eventually consuming it as well. This is a phenomenon that I have never seen happen. We observed them for more than an hour and eventually, the calf started to gain strength to stand by itself. As the mother settled and recovered from the stress and the pains of giving birth, she pushed her way through the group and helped her calf to stand as well and guided it to her mammary glands.

This situation to me was amazing, a new life was entering the world and to see all the elephants protecting and giving support to the mother showed the incredible bond that these animals have with one another.