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When This Baby Elephant Collapses, The Herd Does The Most Remarkable Thing!
If you’re a younger sibling, you likely know first hand that it can be difficult to catch up to the rest when you’re the baby of the group. This baby elephant from the Kruger National Park likely learned this lesson well after collapsing to the ground while trying to keep up with his herd. Fortunately, this baby elephant happened to be a part of a herd that exhibits the “no one left behind” motto. As there are over 7,000 elephants in the Kruger National Park of South Africa, seeing a herd of elephants cross a road is likely a fairly common sight for tourists. However, this video, which was captured by a couple of tourists, shows a very rare, touching act involving a baby elephant and a few other elephants from his herd.
The video starts with the baby elephant trailing behind his herd across the street. While following his herd across a road, this elephant calf is suddenly overcome by fatigue. The baby elephant battles with gravity to stay standing, but ultimately collapses to the ground. The baby elephant lies motionless on the road, showing no signs of getting up any time soon. Due to the presence of trucks and cars on the road waiting for the herd to pass, the elephant calf is in a quite vulnerable position. Fortunately, a few elephants from the herd come to the baby elephant’s rescue. Miraculously, the herd quickly forms a circle to surround the elephant calf to protect him from predators and other threats, such as the cars and humans currently occupying the road. If this wasn’t astonishing enough, what the small herd of elephants does next is even more shocking and touching.
As you can likely imagine, an elephant that has collapsed to the ground is a quite distressing situation for both the baby elephant and its herd. Elephant calves usually weigh about 200 pounds at birth, and they pack on the pounds very rapidly during their first few months of life. Therefore, it is not exactly an easy task to help a baby elephant get to its feet. Despite the immense difficulty of such a task, the small herd of elephants manages to do just that, though not without a considerable amount of effort. Through the use of their trucks as a sort of lever, the herd of elephants tries to help the baby elephant regain his balance. Unsurprisingly, the elephant calf is quite stubborn, as many young children are. After a few moments, the small herd successfully lifts the calf off the ground.
While the herd certainly struggled at first, their efforts never wavered. As a result, the elephant calf was quickly on its feet and following the rest of the herd once again. To see the baby elephant collapse to the ground like that must have been a rather scary moment for the tourists. However, the distressing moment quickly turned into an adorable and touching one with not even a moment’s notice.