Submitted by Garrison Piel on the 2020 winter session program in Tanzania sponsored by the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology…
I’ve seen elephants before. I’ve been watching them on TV since I was a kid. I have gone to zoos and seen the elephants splashing water in an exhibit. Never before have I experienced anything like this. To see a wild elephant herd was a different experience. Calves nursing at their mother’s side, while adults were tearing up grass with muscular trunks 10 feet away from us. We all fell into silent awe. I have seen elephants on TV, and I have seen elephants in captivity. Never before have I seen the same kind of fire as I did in the eyes of the matriarch of that elephant herd.