Elephants are social creatures that thrive on the affection of their herd. This is what makes this video clip all the more interesting. As you watch the video, you’ll see a baby elephant stop by the side of a dirt road and roll onto its back. It is hard to determine whether the elephant was taking care of an itch or experiencing fatigue. Regardless, the baby elephant soon comes out of that position to crawl on its bottom as if reaching out for assistance.
It is at this point that an elephant walks up to the baby. The two elephants touch one other’s trunks, but, other than that gesture, the adult elephants walks past the younger one. Still undaunted, the baby elephants seemingly begins to “ham it up” with actions making it appear to be in distress. Nevertheless, the baby elephant fails to draw a response from a second adult elephant as it walks on by. Finally, the baby elephant arises and catches up to the adult elephants.
It is possible that the baby elephant was either throwing a tantrum or otherwise attention seeking from the adult elephants. In an interesting display of pachyderm parenting, the adults dealt with the insubordinate child elephant by gently ignoring it.
Anyone human parent or caregiver having spent time with a child can relate to how the adult elephants responded. Sometimes the best thing do with a child is to gently ignore its attention grabbing antics. That was certainly the case with this herd.