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The Elephant Whisperer
www.MyAddo.co.za: From cellphones to elephants
FIVE years ago Walter Gwarada was stuck in the office every day, but chance and an impatient American turned him into the “elephant whisperer” of Addo.
Gwarada, who came to South Africa in 2003 after working in information technology at a Zimbabwean cellphone operator in Harare, was hired as a manager for a fledgling private game reserve in Addo, where there was an American brought in to train three tame elephants from Knysna to do safaris.
But after four weeks the American had deserted, saying it couldn’t be done and Gwarada convinced the reserve’s owners to give him a shot.
In three months, Gwarada had the three male elephants, called Mukwa – at four-and-a-half tons the biggest of the three – Duma and Thaba, eating out of his hand, literally.
“With an elephant you’ve got to build trust so you can approach him without fear as he can pick the fear up,” said Gwarada.”
“The best way to build trust is with food – not the whip. Yes, you reprimand them but with reasonable force like you do with children. You say “quit it” if he’s doing something he shouldn’t.”
Gwarada developed a system of food rewards for the elephants – especially fruit such as oranges and apples – to get them to allow people to ride them and follow 15 to 20 simple commands such as “go” and “stop”, “left” and “right”.
“It was very scary when I first got on Mukwa's back. I thought he was going to run away with me,” said Gwarada, remembering a breakthrough moment in 2004.
Soon Gwarada – who has now stepped back from working directly with the three elephants to be the reserve’s marketing manager – needed trained elephant handlers and he turned to Zimbabwe, where elephant safaris were pioneered.
Now there are six trained handlers – mostly Zimbabwean – working at the reserve and it has grown to become an upmarket lodge called Addo Elephant Back Safaris and Lodges that can sleep 20 people.
The elephants can do up to three safaris a day – with no more than two people plus a handler on their backs – and in between they roam around and forage in the 1000-hectare reserve and wallow in two watering holes.
Two handlers must stay with them when they head off into the bush foraging so they don’t lose them and they sleep in an enormous purpose-built hangar at night.
The elephant safaris are done for the lodge guests and day-trippers.
Duma, Thaba and Mukwa also have an interesting tale to tell.
They were born in the Kruger National Park and escaped a cull by being bought by a Knysna private game reserve owner, who is also part owner of the Addo reserve. In Knysna they were tamed and then brought to the Addo area.
They are all between 18 and 21 years, and they will be maturing sexually at about 25, so Gwarada is looking around for two females. If they don’t mate, they will become frustrated and aggressive.
The reserve, however, does not intend to grow its population as one elephant needs between 250ha and 300ha in which to roam and feed.
Gwarada has come to know the three big guys well and says they have distinct personalities.
Duma, for instance, is something of a peacemaker when the other two start getting a bit rough as they are mock fighting.
“I never thought I’d be doing something like this,” said Gwarada, “but I’ve developed a passion for them and now I could never do anything else.”
Source: GILL MOODIE, Daily Despatch