Born Free Foundation - Keep Wildlife in the Wild

Matilda is an adorable baby elephant with a big appetite.  She lives at the Elephant Transit Home, in a place called Udawalawe National Park in southern Sri Lanka.  The Home rescues orphan elephants and returns them to the wild when they are ready.  Little Matilda was just over a year old when she was rescued in January 2007.

Matilda needs 40 pints of milk every day and is fed every three hours, night and day.  She has a very sad story.  Matilda got lost from her mother when her family herd were chased away by people.  The elephants were feeding on the villagers’ growing crops.  Tired and very hungry, Matilda was found living with a herd of water buffalo.  She was too young to survive on her own without her mother’s care.

Luckily, Matilda was rescued by the Elephant Transit Home in their special elephant ambulance.  Today she has grown strong and healthy and sleeps and eats with her friends at the Home.  She is growing more confident and spends each day in a corner of Udawalawe Park, where she can eat grass and leaves wash in the lake and play with the other orphans.