Strangefoot

 Michael - Alternate Thursdays

When I first came to Knysna six years ago, I didn’t believe there were still Knysna elephants. Of course, I knew that there had been elephants here in the past, herds of forest wanderers who possibly belonged to a different subspecies to the bushveld elephants and to the Addo elephants 200 miles to the north east. They were recorded by San rock art in the surrounding caves and mountains, and by reports from the days of the Cape Colony. But I believed they were all gone, probably driven to extinction by the years of heavy logging in the forest and the shrinkage of their habitat. From time to time, people claimed to have seen one or a small group deep in the forest. But from time to time people claim to see the Loch Ness monster and Bigfoot.

Strangefoot

However, I was wrong. Although the sightings were often disputed, there were elephants in the Knysna forests – the only unfenced elephants left in South Africa.

A fanciful drawing of elephants in the Knysna forest circa 1800

The history is a sad one. It turns out that the Knysna and Addo elephants are bushveld elephants, they are not different subspecies but the remnants of what used to be a healthy population in the area. The Addo elephants were nearly exterminated, but were brought back from the brink and now a healthy population flourishes in the Addo Elephant National Park. However, the Knysna elephants continued to decline. By the mid-nineties there was believed to be only a few remaining. No doubt with good intentions but not a lot of forethought, in 1994 three juveniles were introduced from the Kruger National Park. The idea was that the remaining individuals would teach the new arrivals the way to survive in the new environment. The experiment was a failure. Kruger elephants are used to browsing on forest verges, not deep in the forest itself. One died fairly soon of illness, and the others soon made their way out of the deep forest and started interacting with humans to the pleasure of neither group. After a few attempts to drive them back into the forest, they were recaptured and returned to a private game reserve close to Kruger.

By the time I moved to Knysna, the general feeling was that the remaining elephants had died, the end of the Knysna elephants. But two National Park rangers knew that wasn’t the case – one lonely female still remained. They weren’t interested in advertising the fact. They knew how to find her when they wanted to if she was nearby, but she didn’t like other humans and she had the right to her peace. Camera traps set up where they suggested, and dung samples proved conclusively that they were right. Strangefoot, as they called her because of the unusual size and shape of her paw prints, was still around and had made a successful living deep in the forest since around 1980, making her 45 years old with a life expectancy of another 20 years.

Wilfred Oraai (left) and Karel Maswati in the Knysna forest.
Picture Julia Evans

But she’s alone. A sad state for any elephant but particularly for a female, who would normally be part of a herd or at least a family group. Strangefoot’s solitary existence poses a dilemma for conservationists. Some argue that she should be left in peace, while others think that importing more elephants could help preserve her genetic lineage and that leaving a social animal alone is cruel. However, the previous experiment with introducing bushveld elephants is a clear warning.

The new initiative started by seeing what the local people think about the issue. Three quarters of the sample indicated support for adding more elephants for cultural and ecological reasons, but national park scientists warn that people have no experience and little idea of what that actually might mean. The new elephants might not have Strangefoot’s shy disposition. The National Park is trying to move away from the emotional arguments around Strangefoot herself, and more to the cultural and ecological benefits of introducing more elephants. A local elephant park would be willing to donate several individuals and at least these are forest savvy animals. They're used to humans, but that may be a good thing or a bad thing. A lot of discussion, thought and planning is still ahead and the eventual decision is uncertain.

In the meantime, Strangefoot has the forest to herself.