Elephant Insights: A Long-Term Look at Loisaba’s Herds

By Benard Gituku, Conservation Manager

Jul 13 · 3 min read

In early June, Loisaba Conservancy took an important step forward in its long-term elephant monitoring (LTM) programme. With support from San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, our team spent several focused days in the field building on earlier groundwork—formalising the approach, refining protocols, and setting up systems to better understand elephant movements, behaviours, and family dynamics over time.

© Maurice Schutgens

A Timely Start

With the rainy season ending, elephant herds have started splitting into smaller family units, ideal conditions for identifying individuals and understanding social structures. In just two and a half days, our team recorded 12 family groups and 10 independent bulls. Among them was a young male in light musth, and even a rare sighting of a mating event—fascinating moments that offer early insight into reproductive behaviour.

Familiar Faces and Wider Connections

Two collared females were identified during our survey, including Mau (S155) from the Forests family—well known to the team at Save the Elephants, who have led long-term elephant research in Samburu. Her presence at Loisaba reinforces what we’ve long understood: our elephants are part of a wider, interconnected population that ranges across northern Kenya.

As we continue developing our photo ID catalogue, we’ll cross-reference individuals with databases from Samburu and Mpala. These linkages will help build a clearer picture of elephant movements across conservation areas and strengthen collaborative protection efforts.

© Gurcharan Roopra

Eyes on the Ground

We’re also looking at how to involve Loisaba’s human-wildlife rapid response team in collecting ID photos during community patrols. This will expand our monitoring reach, especially in areas where elephants and people often interact, and help identify individuals involved in conflict incidents, allowing for more targeted mitigation.

Investing in Local Capacity

Two of our team members, Ann Wambui (Conservation Officer) and Moses Okombo (Ecology Research Coordinator), are diving into this work with energy and curiosity. Plans are underway for them to gain hands-on experience with our partners at Save the Elephants. These exchanges will build local skills and ensure the Loisaba team continues leading this work long into the future.

What We’re Tracking

The long-term monitoring programme will build a detailed record of Loisaba’s elephants over time, documenting births, deaths, and family relationships. It will also track behaviour—including group size, feeding habits, and notable interactions—while compiling a photographic database of identified individuals, organised by family or bull group. Together, this information will help paint a clearer picture of how elephants live, move, and interact across the landscape.

© Maurice Schutgens

Naming the Herd

Every elephant has a story—and now, a name. As part of the monitoring programme, we’re combining scientific coding with creative naming to build a system that’s both practical for research and meaningful for storytelling. Some families are being grouped alphabetically, making it easier to trace lineages and connections over time. Others draw inspiration from themes we love—like famous artists, with names such as Chagall lending a touch of personality to the profiles we build. This approach not only helps us identify individuals in the field, but also makes it easier to share their journeys with the broader community. By naming the elephants, we’re turning data points into lives—each one recognisable, memorable, and worth protecting.

© Bettina Rühl

Why It Matters

Elephants are more than iconic wildlife—they are keystone species that shape entire ecosystems and define the character of northern Kenya’s wild landscapes. By monitoring them over time, we gain insight into how herds move across the landscape, respond to environmental change, strengthen collaboration across conservation areas, and improve our ability to prevent and respond to human-elephant conflict. Most importantly, this work helps protect the matriarchs and calves that carry the future of these populations.

But this effort is about more than data. It’s about building a deeper understanding of the landscapes we share, and creating space for people and wildlife to coexist. We’re just at the beginning—and we look forward to sharing what we learn, one elephant at a time.