Neil Heron of Bearded Heron Safaris writes in with a unique story of seduction.

I thought you might be interested in reading my account of some elephant behaviour I recently witnessed at Shimangwaneni Dam in the Kruger. After observing 80 elephants frolicking in a sun-lit cloudburst, complete with rainbow backdrop, we stopped to see two family groups by the roadside. There were a few older cows, but youngsters and sub-adults outnumbered them.

On hand was also a big bull – I immediately checked to see if I could see any obvious signs of musth, but his recent escapades in the dam had removed any telltale signs. However, his majestic behaviour and stance soon let me to believe he must be in musth (he also wasn’t feeding). He walked towards a huge marula tree, which had a glorious round crown that was in full leaf. He took one look at the tree, and promptly felled it with two pushes of his forehead. The sound and sight of that tree falling will stay with me for a long time, but what happened next is the main reason for this account.

The bull turned towards the other elephants, almost as if he was calling them. They all ran over to the felled tree and began feeding off it, much like cows feeding from a trough – the majority of them wouldn’t have been tall enough to reach the leaves and branches if it were still standing.

One of my guests exclaimed, “He’s provided food for the others! He’s looking after his family.” This gave me an opportunity to explain the social structures of elephants, noting that the bull wasn’t an immediate part of the family grouping. His presence was more than likely the result of his search for a receptive female to mate with. I said I believed that the elephant bull had pushed over the marula tree in order to gain favour from the cows, and that he might find one of them suddenly becoming more receptive to his mating intentions since his dramatic leafy offering.

Unfortunately I couldn’t stay to watch the story unfold as it was getting late and we needed to move on back to Talamati.

Edition 52: August 2010