Episode 1 Elephant Diaries

Come and meet one of Africa's most unusual families.

We've spent a whole year with a family of elephants raised by people.

It's a family on a hazardous journey back into the wild...

..and this is their story.

SHE LAUGHS

All of these elephants have been orphaned

under traumatic circumstances, having lost their families.

Look at this little elephant.

How can you not adore him?

Will I ever forget an experience like this?

Yeah, all right, there...!

We've just had a call that there's a little orphaned elephant

that needs rescuing in Samburu.

But being rescued is just the beginning.

This is turning out to be much, much more difficult.

This is Nairobi National Park in Kenya,

and I'm here to meet a unique herd of rescued baby elephants.

All of them have had the worst possible start in life.

They've all lost their mothers.

The leader of this little band of orphaned toddlers is Wendi.

She's been here almost since the day she was born.

She never knew her mother, so everything she knows

about being a baby elephant she's learnt from here.

She was only days old and still had her umbilical cord attached

when she was found, abandoned after her family fled from people.

You wouldn't know from looking at her now,

but because she lost her mother at such a young age

her immune system was extremely fragile.

She arrived in a very poor state.

She got a blood transfusion from an older elephant, saving her life,

and now she's healthy, happy and can be pretty mischievous!

Get off my leg!

The only reason that Wendi and the others are alive

is that they've been brought to an elephant nursery unlike any other.

This is a place where playing football

helps kick-start the recovery of brokenhearted babies.

It's a place where bath time fun mends broken spirits

and prepares shy orphans for their return to a life in the wild.

It's a place where a team of devoted keepers become surrogate mothers,

sleeping next to vulnerable babies to give them the reassurance they desperately need.

All of these babies owe their lives to the vision of a remarkable woman.

For 50 years Daphne Sheldrick has helped

nurse orphaned elephants back to life.

Like many Kenyans, she's seen the devastating effect of decades of poaching on wild herds,

and this is her way of giving something back to the elephants.

Over the years, Daphne and her team have rescued more than 100 baby elephants.

As well as looking after their everyday physical needs,

she and her keepers have learnt how to heal the emotional scars

the babies carry after losing their own families in the wild.

Oh, you!

The intensive care and safety of the nursery is just the start of a hazardous journey

designed to give baby elephants a second chance for a normal life.

But the nursery is not their final destination.

The ultimate aim is to get them back into the wild,

but first every one of these babies has to learn what it takes

to be a free-living wild elephant.

The odds are stacked against them.

Only about half of the babies that are rescued survive to see their second birthday.

But this is a story of hope, so over the next year

I'll be getting to know some of the orphans at the nursery in Nairobi

to see if these babies can recover from their loss

and start to learn the skills they need to live as wild adults.

If they make it, they'll graduate to a release site

in the wilds of Kenya's biggest national park,

where Jonathan is following the second stage of their story.

This is Tsavo National Park, and we're about 350km east

of where Michaela is at the Nairobi orphanage.

Tsavo is a huge chunk of Africa.

It's an area the size of Wales,

and this is where the young orphans from Nairobi are brought

when they're ready to begin the gradual process of returning to the wild.

This is perfect elephant country,

and it's home to Kenya's largest population of wild elephants -

10,000 of them living in a complex society

dominated by mature females, the matriarchs.

The hope is that, ultimately, the orphans can one day join them

and live a normal life in the African bush.

For the orphans, the journey from first being rescued to finally returning to the wild

is one of harsh lessons that can take several years to complete.

To see what it takes to make it, I've come to meet an orphan

that the keepers think is nearing the end of that journey.

This is Emily, and she's the matriarch of the orphan herd.

She had a really lousy start in life.

When she was just four weeks old she fell into a cesspit,

and the stench of human waste caused her mother to reject her.

In fact, not only did she reject her,

she picked her up and tossed her through the air.

Luckily for her, she was rescued and taken to the Nairobi nursery.

Emily's now ten and the oldest elephant still being cared for here in Tsavo.

But she's at a crossroads in her life.

For the moment at least she's helping 29 other orphans

learn the ropes and stay out of trouble.

But she's also old enough to leave the security of life

with the keepers and the other orphans

and start a family of her own back in the wild.

The question is, when?

Over the next year, I hope to follow Emily's story and find the answer.

First I need to win her trust,

so Emily's keepers are taking me to meet her

to see if she likes the look of me.

This is crunch time.

Phew! I can feel my heart beating.

Big meeting coming up.

Here they come. What a sight!

Beautiful!

That big elephant in the middle - that must be Emily.

They look absolutely amazing.

This is my first opportunity to see the Tsavo herd.

The first thing you notice is that almost all of them are the same size,

and that's not what you'd expect if it was a wild herd.

That's because all of them are orphans, just like the babies at the nursery with Michaela in Nairobi.

And they look... I mean, look at them!

I can't quite believe I'm doing this.

I'm so used to being out in somewhere like the Masai Mara, where you've got elephants that are wild.

You stay in your car.

The last thing you would want to do amongst elephants is be out on foot like this.

And if I say that Emily is, you know, she's barely a teenager, but she is looking bigger and bigger.

In fact, I don't think I need the binoculars any more.

Now, it's really important that Emily accepts me, so at some point

I'm hoping that she'll come and introduce herself to me,

and then, hopefully, I'll become one of the herd.

Because without her acceptance I haven't got a chance of really following this story.

Whoops.

Uh-oh.

She is suddenly looking very big.

If she wanted to, she could really do me some damage,

so I have to take this nice and easy.

I can actually feel her breath.

She's just breathing down that trunk,

just spraying me in my face.

OK, what's her decision?

Hello.

EMILY SNORTS

Wow. Speechless!

I don't know what she was saying to me, but...

that was pretty amazing, I can tell you.

Phew.

Incredible.

I think it's gonna be OK, but who knows?

Here at the nursery in Nairobi is where the journey back into the wild begins.

No-one knows when or where the next baby is going to need rescuing,

so the team here is always on standby.

Keepers like Edwin dedicate their lives to helping these traumatised babies.

Six years ago, he hoped to be a priest.

Now his life revolves around baby elephants.

Like many of the keepers, before working here

he'd never set eyes on an elephant, let alone looked after one.

But now you'd think he was born to it.

Just look at this scene - you can see that these elephants have such a strong bond with their keepers.

And at this nursery stage, the keepers are vital to the orphans.

They're with them 24 hours a day, they give them love, attention,

they nurture them, they feed them, they sleep with them.

And it's so lovely to see!

It's the bond between the keepers and elephants that helps make this place so unique,

and it's the key to their success with these sensitive and vulnerable young babies.

MOBILE PHONE RINGS

Hello?

Yes.

HE SPEAKS SWAHILI

We've got a rescue down in Samburu.

HE SPEAKS SWAHILI

OK, we'll shoot for five o'clock. Is the pilot there?

The rescue is being co-ordinated by Daphne's daughter Angela.

We'll be there as soon as we can.

As an emergency flight is being organised, the keepers,

led by Edwin, load a truck with essential supplies needed

for the rescue and head out to Nairobi's Wilson Airport.

The call has come from the Samburu National Reserve, a couple of hours away by plane.

What's happened is that a baby elephant has been discovered alone and in trouble.

She's lost both her own mother and her entire family group

and is trying to latch on to any other herd she can find.

But all she's getting is rejection.

At just a few months old, she's still totally dependant on milk.

Sunken temples show that she hasn't fed for days and is suffering from severe dehydration.

A mother pushes her away,

anxious to defend her own baby from this little stranger.

All alone and totally rejected, she has no food or protection.

If she doesn't starve to death, she'll be an easy target for predators.

Without her mother, her life hangs in the balance.

Back in Nairobi, not a second is wasted in getting airborne.

But even as they take off, the keepers have no way of knowing if they can get to her in time.

The abandoned baby is still trying to follow a herd

as they cross a river swollen by recent rains.

Despite their hostility, the little elephant can't resist following them.

But she's taking a huge risk.

Baby elephants are sometimes separated from their mothers

as they try to cross fast-flowing rivers,

and, in fact, this could have been how she lost her own family.

On board the rescue plane with Edwin and the other keepers is a Kenyan Wildlife Services vet.

They have to find the orphan as quickly as possible.

It's getting late, and soon lions and hyenas will be looking for an easy kill.

But they're still an hour's drive away from the river.

Meanwhile, the little orphan is now gambling with her life.

She's being overwhelmed.

She really needs the bigger elephants to help her.

But instead, they're pushing her away.

This seems like a harsh reaction, but taking on a needy, unrelated baby

would jeopardise their own family's future.

With darkness approaching, she's in deep trouble.

Her only hope lies with Edwin and the rescue team...

if they can find her in time.

For the babies already at the Nairobi nursery, the chaos of their rescues is behind them.

But the trauma lives on.

Like all babies, they thrive on routine, and here it helps mend shattered lives.

So each day follows a set pattern.

When they first arrive, some of the orphans are so distressed

after losing their mothers, they simply give up the struggle to live.

But friendships formed with the other little ones here

can make the difference between life and death.

This is where Wendi comes in.

The nursery encourages the orphans to live as they should in the wild.

So just as a wild herd has its matriarch...

the baby herd has its own mini-matriarch, Wendi.

She's got a big heart and takes any newcomers under her wing,

mothering them until they can gain their confidence.

The younger babies look up to her, and Wendi's natural affection

helps fill the emotional void left by losing their own mothers.

Throughout the day, the elephants move around,

so that they can graze on different foods.

It also gives them a chance to get to know each other and work as a herd

and sort out what their role is, although Wendi is always the leader.

This is basically what would happen with a wild herd of elephants.

The big difference is, though, in the wild it would be a herd with lots of different ages,

and the leader would be an old female of at least 50 plus.

Here, it's a bunch of orphans, and an elephant less than two years old has to take responsibility.

Wendi's always ready to welcome any new arrival,

provided an orphaned baby can survive long enough to reach the nursery.

Back in Samburu, things are going from bad to worse.

By the time the rescue team finds the abandoned baby,

it's too dark to fly her out, and if they can't capture her,

Edwin knows she's unlikely to survive the night.

She may be weak and starving, but fear gives her the strength to run for her life.

The team can't risk losing her.

It's the wildlife vet who manages to catch her.

ELEPHANT GRUNTS

She's so scared they need to cover her head with a blanket to calm her down.

ELEPHANT SQUEALS

As the vet checks her out, the priority is to get some rehydration fluid into her,

probably the first proper drink she's had since losing her mother.

If she doesn't take the bottle, they could lose her in the night.

For Emily's herd of older orphans, the routine of daily life in Tsavo

follows a similar pattern to the one they grew up with in the Nairobi nursery.

At first light, the keepers let the elephants out from the safety of their overnight stockades.

They then take a step back, and Emily takes charge.

Elephants live as long as we do and go through the same stages of life

at the same time as us, so all these youngsters are really just children.

They still need the guidance of an older elephant like Emily.

That's a pretty good way to start the morning, isn't it?

Stretching, rubbing...

You've got food to hand, as well.

With Emily leading and protecting the orphans, every day spent in the park

brings them a step closer to becoming wild elephants again.

Now, here in Tsavo, the elephants are allowed to roam completely wild,

so this is their first chance to really find out what is or isn't dangerous out in the bush.

The keepers are still here, but they're more in the background.

Each day is different, because there's no knowing who or what they'll meet next.

This time it's just the neighbours, a herd of curious giraffe.

But in thick stuff like this, the young orphans need to be on their guard.

And if there is something or someone new, the herd can usually rely on Emily to be the first in.

Emily just checking us out.

Hi, Emily. I suppose you could describe this as the equivalent of an elephant handshake!

You can feel her just blowing warm air back up to me.

It's amazing, that trunk.

She can do anything she wants with it, and, of course, if she wanted to

she could just pick me up and throw me away. But she's so gentle.

Hello.

I don't think she liked the way I tied my laces up!

You know, it's wonderful to feel her relaxing enough to allow me to join her herd.

It means I CAN get really close to her over the coming months

as she decides whether she's going to stay with the orphans or head back to the wild.

In Nairobi, Daphne and the keepers are waiting for news of the little Samburu baby.

For chest, OK?

Stress...

Everyone fears the worst, but preparations are being made, hoping for the best.

If she does make it, she'll be desperately hungry,

so a unique milk formula pioneered by Daphne is made ready.

The keepers try to anticipate her physical needs,

but no-one knows what state she'll be in emotionally.

Back in Samburu, the morning brings good news.

The little orphan has survived the night.

But now she has to be sedated for her flight to Nairobi.

A plane is no place for a traumatised elephant.

Despite a sleepless night, Edwin can't relax for a moment.

He's constantly checking on the latest addition to his orphan family

to ensure that she's still breathing.

Too much anaesthetic could kill her.

As soon as they touch down, there's a truck from the nursery waiting to take her to her new home.

They rush her straight to the nursery, desperate to get her to safety before she starts to wake up.

As the nursery's newest member arrives, she's welcomed by Daphne.

She decides to put her into the stable next to Wendi,

hoping that the mini-matriarch will be able to comfort and reassure her.

ELEPHANT GRUNTS

As she comes round, mattresses are on hand to stop her hurting herself...

ELEPHANT SQUEALS

as she panics at all the strange sights and smells.

She's naturally confused, and very frightened by all the people around her.

She's also suffering from the aftereffects of the anaesthetic, so anything could happen.

This is the first real chance to see what state she's in

and if her ordeal has left any lasting physical damage.

After two days without sleep, Edwin hands her over to the other keepers.

With coaxing, she accepts a much-needed drink of milk.

It's a good sign, but she's by no means out of danger yet.

She's still clinging to life,

but she could so easily have caught deadly pneumonia from the flooded river.

The keepers have decided to call her Naserian, Samburu for "lucky one".

Only time will tell if that's true.

Right now, the only certainty is that the next 24 hours are going to be critical.

Tomorrow on Elephant Diaries, there's a big move ahead for Wendi and the older Nairobi orphans.

In Tsavo, how will Emily react when her herd encounters wild elephants?

And will Naserian win her battle for life?