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Baby Elephants Learning to be elephants
Learning to be an elephant looks like fun, but it is also serious business. The photos’ numbers, which correlate with the following description, are revealed by mouseover for you to follow along before looking at the enlarged images if you wish. Bombani, born April 10, 2025, to Talia, and Kijani, born four days later on April 14 to Xolani, are the first two of four baby elephants ever born at the Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita, Kansas. These photos were taken 6 and 7 weeks after Bombani and Kijani were born. Visitors who watched for a while noticed, in addition to being adorably cute, that each was actually working hard at learning how to be an elephant. The first image shows them lined up by the mothers for trunk lessons with Bombani on the left and Kijani on the right. Photos 2 and 3 show mom demonstrating the finer points of opening and then grasping with the tip of the trunk. Photos 4 and 5 show them walking to the next activity, which (Photo 6) is Kijani taking a mud bath. It is not just fun. It cools an elephant off and leaves a coat of dirt to protect the delicate skin surface from the sun and insects. Kijani is drying off in photo 7, and in photos 8 and 9 both are back together visiting. Elephants are very social, and they get to know each other very well. The trunk is prominently used in getting to know each other and in communicating. After checking in with mom (photo 10-11), they play in the dirt pit (Photos 12-13), which also helps protect their skin. They then go on a trip together (Photos 14-15), which leads to more playing (Photo 16), where they notice one of the moms working with a stick. That looks like fun, so Kijani (Photo 17), forgetting his trunk lessons, tries to pick one up with his mouth. He is promptly taken to the stick pile and shown how trunks are used to handle sticks. (Photos 18-20) Kijani proudly shows off his stick and displays his handling prowess in photo 21, and he walks away with mom and a newly chosen stick. Photo 22. I also saw but did not capture in a photo Kijani complain when Bombani was being too overbearing in play and mom calmly but unmistakably correcting Bombani by gently laying her trunk on Bombani’s shoulders.