Left to Die in a Poacher’s Snare, Baby Elephant is Rescued After Horrendous Suffering

Attacked and left for dead, after poachers found his tusks virtually non-existent, little Simotua was sighted by rescuers from The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust hanging to life from injuries to both his head and encircling his right front leg. (He was also found to be malnourished and dehydrated from his inability to walk any great distance to find food or water), reported The Daily Mail Online.

Upon closer inspection of the 15 month old elephant baby, who lay dying in the Rumuruti Forest of Kenya (a cavernous gash across his skull from a “large spear” and a “to the bone” wound on his leg from the still attached metal poacher’s snare) it became apparent that he needed immediate “intensive care”.

DSWT rescuers removed the vile poacher’s trap from the baby elephant, Simotua

After removing the deeply embedded trap the DSWT team drove the baby elephant to “the local airstrip” where a “mobile veterinary team” was waiting. They worked “onsite to mobilize the calf, administering antibiotics” to prepare Simotua for flight. After landing in Nairobi, home of the charity and world-renowned “Elephant Orphanage,” workers were able to more thoroughly clean the wound and apply the green clay used to soothe and prevent infection.

After his rescue in June, and going through a period of adjustment to his “new surroundings” the calf is now “thriving and making new friends” at the sanctuary. His wounds are “healing well” and, with hope, little Simotua will be “released back into the wild” when he is a fully grown elephant.

The viciousness of poaching

But not all cures come in the form of a salve or an antibiotic drip. Sometimes the kind words he hears from his keepers or the “soft touches from the trunks” of the “other infant elephant orphans” is all of the medicine that little Simotua really needs.

That, and an elephant world free from the viciousness of poachers.

Please don’t forget that “all DSWT projects are reliant on your kind support”.