Many will remember Chelsea Clinton's adorable reports last August
from the Kenyan preserve for orphaned elephants run by naturalist Daphne
Sheldrick. Some may even remember Sheldrick's difficult and
heartbreaking struggle decades ago to develop the correct formula for
baby elephants that would allow them to survive and thrive. It was
gratifying to see that not only has she found the formula but has
managed, over the years, to save many infant elephants rescued from the
wild after their mothers were murdered by poachers. Chelsea's reports
aired both on the
Nightly News with Brian Williams and on the late, lamented
Rock Center which many miss.
From the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust:
Established
35 years ago by Dame Daphne Sheldrick in memory of her late husband
David Sheldrick, the founder warden of Kenya’s giant Tsavo National
Park, the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust (DSWT) is dedicated to the
protection and conservation of wildlife and habitats in Kenya. The
charity is best known for its pioneering work with orphaned elephants.
Daphne Sheldrick has been living alongside elephants for 50 years and
she was the first person to successfully hand-rear a milk-dependent
newborn elephant.
Today the charity has successfully returned 91
elephant orphans to the wild, with another 53 currently reliant on their
care. There are 22 baby elephants ages 2 years and under at the DSWT
Nursery in Nairobi and another 31 adolescents, graduates of the Nursery,
at their two reintegration centres in Tsavo East National Park.
Increasingly
the animals the DSWT is called to rescue are ivory orphans; their
mothers murdered before their eyes for their tusks; while climate
change, drought, a burgeoning human population and livestock place
further pressure on land and elephant populations. Already in 2012, the
DSWT has been called to 17 baby elephant rescues.
Read more and see many adorable videos and pictures here >>>>
On Monday,
WaPo reports, Chelsea's formidable mom, as a private citizen, enlisted in the battle against elephant poaching.
By Juliet Eilperin
Hillary
Rodham Clinton will join with environmentalists to press for an end to
elephant poaching (Credit: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP)
Hillary Rodham Clinton has agreed to take up the public fight of saving African elephants, who are being slaughtered in large numbers to supply the growing demand for ivory in China and other Asian countries.
Clinton, who met privately with representatives from a dozen
environmental groups and National Geographic at the Wildlife
Conservation Society’s Central Park Zoo on Monday, pledged to use her
political connections as America’s former secretary of state to enlist
other world leaders in the effort to curtail the illegal ivory trade.
Read more >>>>
