With tusks that every weigh over 100 kilos (45 kilograms) and infrequently scrape the bottom, “super tuskers” are elephants that dwell as much as their title.
This uncommon trait is the results of a genetic variation that causes the tusks to develop quicker and longer than common. While it offers the elephants a robust and distinctive look, it additionally makes them weak to poaching.
Fewer than 30 of those giants stay in Africa, in line with the Tsavo Trust, which displays elephant populations in Kenya’s Tsavo Conservation Area.
Most of the surviving tremendous tuskers, also referred to as “great tuskers,” are present in southern Kenya, the place Italian-born photographer Federico Veronesi has spent years monitoring and photographing them. His new ebook, “Walk the Earth,” the fruits of years of labor in Kenya and past, pays tribute to the elephants he calls “the last witnesses of a world before humans took over the Earth.”
As a toddler rising up in Italy, Veronesi was captivated by African wildlife. That fascination led him to Kenya, the place he ultimately settled and started photographing the animals he had admired for therefore lengthy.
“Photography is almost like a medium through which I get to stay among the animals and express my love for them,” mentioned Veronesi.
Elephants grew to become his central focus, not only for their grandeur, however for the best way they appeared to embody the soul of Africa for him. “When you see an elephant walking through a savanna,” he mirrored, “it’s so evocative, like everything about Africa is in that one scene.”
The ebook is rooted in Veronesi’s encounters with a few of Kenya’s most iconic elephants. One of probably the most vital got here in 2010, when he first noticed Tim, the legendary tremendous tusker of Amboseli National Park.
“We were waiting as the elephants made their daily walk from the woodlands to the marsh,” he remembered, “when this massive bull appeared with tusks so long, they nearly touched the ground.”
For Veronesi, it was as if a childhood dream had develop into actuality. Tim reminded him of tales of Ahmed, a fantastic tusker so revered in Kenya that within the 1970s, President Jomo Kenyatta declared him a “living monument” and assigned him armed guards for cover.
“Through the book I also wanted to show different aspects of elephants’ lives,” Veronesi mentioned, “such as courtship with Tim, fighting, mud-bathing, swimming, reaching up for branches and social relationships.”
Veronesi additionally sought to spotlight the range of habitats the place elephants dwell throughout Africa, from the deserts of Namibia to the Tanzania’s Ngorongoro Crater and Mana Pools National Park in Zimbabwe.
Veronesi’s favourite picture is considered one of Balguda, “probably the greatest tusker alive at the moment,” as described in his ebook. Balguda was solely recognized from occasional sightings throughout aerial patrols and Veronesi spent years in search of him.
In August 2023, in a distant nook of Tsavo, Balguda lastly appeared. “I still can’t believe that I finally managed to see and photograph him, to have breathed the same air as him. The image of him walking in the riverbed will probably remain with me forever – one of my most intense encounters in the wild,” Veronesi writes within the ebook.
“I always told myself, if I find him, then I will do the book,” he added.
Photography and conservation
“Walk the Earth” is Veronesi’s third images ebook, and he has been engaged on it for the previous 5 years. It highlights the threats elephants face right this moment: habitat loss, human-wildlife battle, and the continued hazard of trophy searching, particularly for the few remaining nice tuskers.
Veronesi has lengthy used his images to assist defend wildlife. He says he donates pictures to conservation organizations, contributes to consciousness campaigns and has spoken internationally, together with in China, the place he offered his wildlife photographs to boost consciousness about ivory demand.
Veronesi strives to not solely doc elephants as specimens, however to painting them as people. “The goal is always to make the viewer connect with the animal, to look into its soul somehow,” he mentioned.
That connection requires endurance and perspective. He typically positions his digital camera low to the bottom, so the elephant appears to tower over the body. Many of his strongest pictures are in black and white.
“Elephants have this incredible aura of calm patience,” he mentioned. “They convey a way of knowledge, of information. And on the identical time, they’re extraordinarily social and caring for one another.
“They make everything seem fine. Like the whole world is grazing and nothing is happening.”