by David Daballen

On July 04 2010 we received very sad news that a young girl who was herding her family's goats had been killed by a bull elephant.

Since the incident took place about 30kms or more away from us, and we received the information later in the day, we decided to visit the scene the following morning just to enquire from the local people for a full account of how it happened in the hope we would be able to identify the elephants that killed her through the description.

Due to the sensitivity of the whole issue, we decided we would go straight to look for the West Gate scouts, and asked for the full story rather than going to the village. This is what we found after talking to the scouts: The 15 year’s old girl whose family name was Leparshaua was herding their goats near the Nyiro River.

At around mid-day the goats come down for drink,  after  half an-hour in the water they crossed the river into south bank on the shed’s and feeding on acacia pods, which are nutritious food for the animals. The little girl didn’t follow the goats immediately and stayed behind in the river until the goats disappeared into the bushes.

It was time for her to run and look for their goats; unfortunately the goats were not too far, on the bank, on the same shed with Elephants feeding on acacia pods. The poor little girls didn’t see the elephant until it was too late and the two bulls charged them and caught up with one of them, killing her instantly.

In the distance there were other herders, who must have heard the whole commotion; the girls screaming and the elephant’s trumpets. Two junior warriors rushed to the scene and found the elephants chasing goat’s indifferent direction, they found the second little girl who was terrified and told them what had happened.

By now the two bulls had left and the search for the missing girl started, they found her dead very close to where they first got charged.  They immediately phoned the scouts and everyone come down.  

In Samburu tradition anything killed by elephant would not be brought back to home if it is a cow or a goat; nobody would eat it. In this case since its a human being, they can only place it in a shed and cover it with some green branches and let it rest in peace. In this case the government got involved and the body was taken by the police.

In conclusion, since I didn’t see the elephant, or a picture of the animal, it was difficult to say who did it. Normally there is little compensation and since the government was involved.  I would hope there will be some sort of compensation.

This time of the year June-July, all the acacia pods, which most of the animals love feeding on, are ready and there is so much competition among different species, from Livestock to Wildlife.

What we can do to minimize such problems  in future, is for STE to write something simple which can be understood by everyone, then  drop them in most of the conservancies officers, so that scouts can be given the tasks of informing the young ones who take car of the goats to be careful.