Elephants galore this time in India

We’ve visited India three times in three years—mostly in search of wildlife—but the elephants have often managed to elude us.

I have to admit that on our first two trips, we saw elephants in a couple of national parks, but they were almost always specks on the horizon or shrouded by jungle. Should I say I’ve seen an elephant in the wild if all I’ve seen is a grey rump or a waving trunk or a flicking tail? I think not.

Of course, I’m not counting the working elephants we saw. These weren’t tourist elephants, but part of India’s parks and forestry department. The first ones we saw were on a mission to guide a roaming tiger back into its national park. The bottom line was to save the tiger’s life and the lives of any citizens who might get in the way.

We also saw a lone tusker in the distance in Rajaji National Park on the same day we saw three leopards. He moved so quickly I couldn’t get a photo, but he was huge.

Mother with young tusker and baby

Time to go

While I think of it, I’ll mention that most of India’s national parks no longer offer elephant rides as a way to let tourists look for tigers. And even when such rides were offered, we didn’t take them.

So I was pleased that this trip delivered elephants, elephants and more elephants, and virtually all of them in the wild.

Frankly, it was to be expected. Elephants seem to be more common in the south, and this trip focused on the south—from Bhopal in the middle to Kanyakumari, on the country’s most southern tip.

Our first encounter was in Tadoba National Park, where we saw two adults and a baby. But that was only just the beginning because the farther south we travelled the more elephants we saw.

Every sighting was reassuring, especially when we saw the babies. These amazing beasts are considered endangered. Surveys indicate there are 35,000–40,000 Asian elephants left in the wild. About three-quarters of these are in India, with other populations spread across the many countries of southeast Asia and the subcontinent (although there aren’t any known to be in Pakistan).

Asian elephants are generally smaller than African elephants. They reach a shoulder height of 2 to 3.5 metres and weigh between 2000 to 5000 kilograms (up to 11,000 pounds). Females are usually smaller than males and have no or only small tusks.

Grabbing a quick snack

Their appetites are huge. Adult elephants eat up to 150 kilograms of grasses, plants and trees per day. And they poop throughout the day. Anand always says the only way to know how old elephant dung is, is to stick your finger in. We didn’t need to know that much, but when we were walking, we saw what looked like a lot of fresh dung.

After Tadoba, our next elephant encounter was almost two weeks later in Nagarhole National Park. Then over the next two weeks we saw probably 50 elephants of all ages and in different settings. We saw an especially large herd in Periyar National Park, but I’ll write a separate post about all the wildlife there.

We even saw elephants on the side of the road (not in a national park) as we travelled from the state of Karnataka to Kerala. We stopped and watched them for quite some time and then some knuckleheads came up behind us and got out of their vehicle. Needless to say, the elephants skedaddled and the knuckleheads were lucky they weren’t attacked.

Elephants have right of way.

I felt bad about a young French couple we later met at the state border. They had taken a taxi from their hotel in Kerala and hoped to cross into Karnataka, where elephants are quite common. Turned out their taxi driver didn’t have an all-India travel permit, so could not cross the state line, and no other taxis were around.

So if you’re ever travelling by road in India, be sure the vehicle is allowed to cross state borders (although there is a plan to scrap the border regulations).

Update on the guy illegally parking in a disabled space
You may remember my rant about the guy who was parking in a disabled space at the gym. Once I had photographic evidence (of him striding away) I called the city’s hotline to report him, but a few weeks later he was still parking there.

So I called the hotline again and said I’d be calling every time I saw him. Haven’t seen him again. 🙂 But if I do, I’ll get an elephant to sit on his car. Maybe one of the fellows below.

A tusker with a resident bird on his head

Notice how much longer the tusks are on this fellow than the tusker just above