Elephant Voices

Category: 2. Field News Kenya, Elephant Photos, Elephant Sounds | Date: Feb 15 2008 | By: admin

The comment we received from Anna in response to Meeting Mr. Nick prompts me to write this post. She mentions a male named Edo, who originally came from Amboseli’s EB family, and is now living in Tsavo National Park. Back in September 1989 Emily, one of the adult female members of the EB family, died after feeding on garbage at Amboseli Lodge.

After days of searching we found Emily’s carcass lying by Amboseli Lodge rubbish heap.

Amboseli National Park Warden discusses a clean up with the managers of Amboseli Lodge.

The incident provoked an outcry, and we published a story in the Daily Nation exposing all of the items we found in her stomach (though this prompted a clean up by the lodge then, Amboseli Lodge and its surrounds are still a disgrace 18 years later). Emily died leaving her adult daughter, Eudora, and a six-month-old son. Her infant was too young to survive without his mother’s milk and we decided to ask the The Sheldrick Orphanage to take him in.

At the time of Emily’s death I was working with a Japanese film crew (remember elephants and the ivory trade were a big issue for the Japanese) and the capture of her male calf became an integral part of the story. The crew gave him a Japanese name, Edo, which is the term for the ancient city of Tokyo. Capturing Edo was no simple task and I made the mistaken judgment that a six month old elephant could fit into the back of an Izuzu Trooper. Well, when he tried to escape over the front seats he popped out one of the back windows, dented the roof of the car and pushed me onto the gear shift and I had pain sitting for the next 18 months!

When I worked in Tsavo in 1998 I had a chance to see and even record him. He was a big boy then and not permitted to stay with Malaika and the younger calves at night. He obviously missed their companionship though, because as he walked off for his night alone, he repeatedly called out to them with “Let’s go”rumbles, some of which were answered by Malaika, Ewaso and the others.

It is lovely to see his photo on the link that Anna sent because he looks so like his mother, Emily, and sister, Eudora! Note that his tusks are what we call “asymmetrical left higher” - and so were his mother’s and his sister, Eudora.

Put on your headphones to hear (low frequency sounds, difficult to hear through lousy computer speakers…)
- Edo calling “Let’s go” to his companions:Put on your headphones to hear Edo calling “Let’s go” to his companions.
- a distant Edo calling (barely audible) and Malaika (louder) answering:Edo calling, Malaika answering

Spectrograms that show time/frequency of the calls mentioned above. (Click to see larger)

Eudora strolls by; note her asymmetrical tusks with the left tusk higher.

Edo (photo from the Sheldrick Trust website) looks like his mother and older sister; note his higher left tusk.