Africa. Large orphans.

Tsavo National Park, one of the largest national parks in the world.



In 1987, Daphne Sheldrick, who founded an orphanage Nairobi Elephant. A pioneer in the field of wildlife rehabilitation, she became the first person to take a nursing infants orphaned African elephant.



Rangers put in a makeshift raincoat kid that would protect against the cold, the rain and the risk of pneumonia.



On a morning walk. Senior junior lie inviting to play with them. Tactile contact is very important in the elephant community.



Elephant welter of salvation was about two weeks at the time of photography



Every three hours orphans fed milk with vitamin additives. Formula structure developed over decades, feeding elephants in nevole.Samy little pressed against the warden.



Orphans are returned to the wild herds, regions devastated by poaching decades ago. Intumba Mountain near the northern border of the park.



Emily - an orphaned elephant, who now lives alone and manages a herd of 22, the same fellow prisoners released into the wild. She is now 17 years old. Poachers wounded by an arrow in its back leg, and then the elephant vets have the necessary assistance.



Emily meets a senior ranger Joseph Suna, a veterinarian who removed the jammed her foot in the boom. Suna said that elephants are often raised in captivity, but later released to freedom, returned to the person if they need help or to show their young.



Several men were needed to lift and carry slonёnka in stoilo.On died the next day. Elephants are difficult to adapt to captivity, being away from family.



The superintendent shows the depth to which the spear penetrated Glowe 20-month Murka. A year after her rescue, Murka left kindergarten and became one step closer to a reunion with a group of wild elephants.



Too young and fragile to get in touch with other orphans, the two-week Vasin swaddled in blankets, his warmth poor substitute for his dead mother. A few weeks Vasin died suddenly of unknown cause.



Elephant Mzima victim of poachers, welcomes students visiting with a tour of Tsavo National Park. "For the old poacher," says Daphne Sheldrick, "the elephants is the only flesh and bones. But the world is changing, and a new generation will be kinder ».



Slonyata need a lot of attention, it is best kids feel with their own kind, so they are not allowed to be alone. The process of adaptation in the group begins as soon as the worst injuries heal.



Senior guard baby elephants bathing



Shakur was found by local shepherds after she fell into a manhole pipe in Kenya



Elephants and people are bound to each other. "We're not here for a wage labor," says a veteran superintendent. "The longer you hang out with elephants, the more you begin to love them».



Photos National geographic / Michael Nichols.