Young elephant refuses to share mud bath with brother

While on safari in the Kruger National Park, we found a small herd of elephants standing a riverbed. The sun was sitting high already and it was getting very hot. We saw some of the elephants took the opportunity to go lie down in the mud, cooling themselves down in the process. At the same time the elephants can get rid of any pesky insects and ticks sitting on their skin. Watching elephants enjoying themselves while having a mud bath is mostly a very entertaining experience. Unlike any other animal, elephants really do have fun in all sorts of ways when they are in the mud or water. We were watching two young male elephants lying in the mud when a third young male appeared.

The young male wanted to join his two brothers for a cool down in the mud. When the elephant decided to go lie down in between his two brothers, the one brother was having none of that. He simply stretched out his one leg and pushed his brother away, making it clear that he cannot come closer to share the mud bath. At one stage the young elephant kept his brother away from him for quite some time using his stiff leg up in the air, pushing against his brother’s side. The middle elephant eventually realized that he was not going to get comfortable in the small space between his two brothers.

He leaned against his brother for a short while before getting kicked again repeatedly. The young elephant got the message that he was not welcome and decided to move on and find his own mud bath. It was really funny to watch these two young males fooling around in the mud. As they say, ‘boys will be boys’ and these two elephants displayed the typical behavior of two brothers not preparing to share much at a young age.