{"id":489,"date":"2025-09-04T05:51:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T05:51:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/489\/"},"modified":"2025-09-04T05:51:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T05:51:07","slug":"wildlife-photographer-captures-pictures-of-happy-elephant-family-in-kenyan-safari","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/489\/","title":{"rendered":"Wildlife photographer captures pictures of happy elephant family in Kenyan safari"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A wildlife photographer has captured pictures of the world\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/tag\/elephants\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">happiest elephant family<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Andy Rouse documented a Kenyan herd with incredibly playful young calves.<\/p>\n<p>The award-winning British snapper shot the small elephants playing around with branches, and appearing fascinated by the adults pooping.<\/p>\n<p>Andy says, \u201cI lead safari tours several times a year and love going to Samburu in Kenya as the elephants there are special.<\/p>\n<p>A wildlife photographer has captured pictures of the world\u2019s happiest elephant family. Andy Rouse \/ SWNS<\/p>\n<p>Andy Rouse documented a Kenyan herd with incredibly playful young calves. Andy Rouse \/ SWNS<\/p>\n<p>The young elephants appeared happy and playful. Andy Rouse \/ SWNS<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey are very, very relaxed, and because of this, the herds will let you get very close to them and will pass close to vehicles without any issues.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am completely relaxed with the incredible elephants of Samburu. On this occasion, we found a large breeding herd with several youngsters, less than 3 months old, who seemed very playful.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe positioned the vehicle well ahead of them so the matriarch had time to get used to us and felt comfortable. It\u2019s so important when you work with elephants, as I have done for all of my 25-year career, that you understand them and work within their tolerances.<\/p>\n<p>The British photographer shot the small elephants playing around with branches, and appearing fascinated by the adults pooping. Andy Rouse \/ SWNS<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI lead safari tours several times a year and love going to Samburu in Kenya as the elephants there are special,\u201d Rouse said. Andy Rouse \/ SWNS<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am completely relaxed with the incredible elephants of Samburu. On this occasion, we found a large breeding herd with several youngsters, less than 3 months old, who seemed very playful,\u201d he continued. Andy Rouse \/ SWNS<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe female and the herd settled around us, grazing. The calves took it upon themselves to create havoc, chasing birds, doing mock charges to our vehicle, and playing tug of war with branches. Their antics made us laugh out loud. Young elephants are just lovable idiots, and I so love working with them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne of the calves was fascinated by poo! Every time an adult went for a poo, the youngster would watch and try to sniff it! Luckily, it avoided getting pooed on!<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe thirty minutes that we spent with this herd was one of the highlights of the trip, all the more special as I had my 10-year-old daughter on her first safari. To dictate to her about the wonder of elephants, the dangers saving them, and the need to conserve them was a special thing indeed.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A wildlife photographer has captured pictures of the world\u2019s happiest elephant family. Andy Rouse documented a Kenyan herd&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":490,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[50,861,862,111,139,69,147,406,255],"class_list":{"0":"post-489","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-animals","9":"tag-elephants","10":"tag-kenya","11":"tag-new-zealand","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-science","15":"tag-wildlife","16":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}