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elephants
One thing about elephants that you will also need to consider is the tusk less female. Because of past ivory hunting the number of tusk less animals in the population (percentage wise) has increase over the years.
These toothless (often ladies) need to take food from tusked animals and by that fact become more aggressive or starve. They are also more likely to raid crops since they don't need to strip tree branches for food. Now you have an animal that has agressive tendencies and encounters with people. Put them in a herd and protecting young elephants you decrease the chances that it is a bluff charge.
What really surprised me during my safari was how well the elephant can hide in cover. We had one elephant close the gap from 35 meters down to 20 meters; it was more curious of what was making the noise and came to investigate. I am going to try to attach the photograph from 25 meters.
That was the second elephant of the day. The first one we spotted sleeping in some brush while tracking buffalo. We by passed the elephant without any problem and got back on the buffalo track, as we moved up the hill to the buffalo we spotted the herd. We really wanted to circle down wind but that would put our scent right down to the elephant. As we moved to the side the buffalo spooked and ran down the hill, which spooked the elephant which ran up the hill to spook us.
Needless to say there was a lot of spooking going on in a short timeframe.
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