Elephants

When we tell people about the bush most stories are about the fact that the bush is so peaceful. You see beautiful animals , see trees waving in the wind, hear birds singing and hear water floating through the rivers.

But sometimes, sometimes the bush is not so quiet, like we experienced last night!!! We woke up because we heard wood cracking. We listened for a while but the noise would not go away. So I got up, took a torch and went outside onto the porch. Two elephants choose our garden as dining area and were eating our trees. Elephants are like termites: They come overnight and destroy! They are only slightly bigger then termites!

I went back into bed, but could not sleep anymore. I was only thinking about what the elephants could have destroyed in our garden. So this morning at 07.00 I got up to check the damage….. They had decided to eat some of the branches of the trees next to the laundry room. Then they went to the neighbours, came back and ate some of the leaves of the trees in between rooms 2 and 3 and left again. Well leaves are not so disturbing, but when I took a further look I saw to my horror that they destroyed our beautiful big aloe, with his gorgeous yellow/orange flowers. The aloe that attracted so many birds, especially the Loerie who sang his/her song every morning. Actually spoke his/her sentence every day, because an other name for Loerie is “Go away” bird. He/she has a sound that gives you the idea that that he/she says “Go away”. So funny! Now the Loerie has to find him-/herself a new aloe to speak from.

I took some pictures and cleaned up the mess the elephants left behind. Now we have to wait for the next time they decide to have our trees as a snack.

Update: the elephants are here now every night and destroy everything! Our trees and plants in the garden are gone or completely stripped. See photo's. If somebody has ideas how to keep the elephants away from tasty things, please let us know!!!