Samui Elephant Sanctuary

Breaking news! We have built a new mud pit and the elephants love it! 🤎

See them play in this new mudpit at:

https://www.samuielephantsanctuary.org/chawengnoi-ses

We're letting you into a little secret today 🤫✨️ Yani, Suda and Sompan share a very unique friendship. Every so often, the three of them congregate - not to the physical closeness of the other friendships in the herd, but simply to know the others are near. Today, Sompan walked herself over to join Yani and Suda.

Choose one of the herd to adopt at:

https://www.samuielephantsanctuary.org/our-elephants

We save elephants because saving all life on Earth is the ultimate mission 🌏

We act now, because we are on the edge of being too late.

Comment your hope here 💚

Myth: there should be a limit to how many years an elephant can give rides for.

Truth: no amount of time is acceptable.

For Khum Phean, she rarely saw shade. For this reason, her skin is severely damaged. Even when the saddle came off, and the bullhooks were laid to rest, the impact lives on.

Here, we soothe her skin with coconut oil and other natural remedies, alleviating the itching and irritation for her.

Your one-off ride has a life-long impact on elephants.

To help support us with Khum Phean's medical needs, please consider adopting her at:

https://www.samuielephantsanctuary.org/product-page/sponsor-khum-phean

Daily dust baths for Kham San and Kham Pang 🤎

You can add to their terrain by planting a tree at:

https://www.samuielephantsanctuary.org/treeprogram

Only birds should ride elephants 🐦🐘 We saw your comment, and we couldn't agree more!

Often the birds (pigeons and mynas, usually) land on the elephants backs, sometimes for insects, other times for a place to rest!

But beyond this, elephant backs are not built to carry the weight of humans.

This is why people nickname elephants 'gentle giants'. Their devotion to one another is not just felt between themselves, but evident to us humans too.

Watch as Kham San and Mae Kham Pang playfully steal grass from one another, and then interact with their trunks kisses. Here in their close social interactions, they smell one another, read one another, and communicating through sound, touch, taste and sight 🩶🐘

You can witness this at our Bophut Sanctuary, at:

https://www.samuielephantsanctuary.org/book-ses-bophut

When we removed Ma Mai's chains for the first time in nearly 50 years, it freed her in more than one way ❌️⛓️❤️

This is Ma Mai not even 1 year after her rescue! Explorative, communicative, playful. Chaining elephants not only traps their body, but traps their (highly intellectual) minds.

Truthfully, she has been enjoying her life like this for many months. She settled in very quickly, most likely relieved beyond our imagination to have the saddle (howdah) removed, chains cut open, and bullhooks and spears laid to rest.

What this shows is no matter how much humans try to control an elephant, and what extremes they go to to break their spirit, an elephant's natural, instinctual self is always there with them. In Ma Mai's case, the freedom here at has allowed her to come back to herself. Other elephants are not so fortunate. To adopt Ma Mai, please visit

https://www.samuielephantsanctuary.org/product-page/sponsor-ma-mai

We so hope Cartoon returns from elephant hospital soon, so Kham Kaew and her can be reunited ❤️‍🩹

Here, you can see how close they are - Kham Kaew enjoys Cartoon’s company so much she wants to eat her!

When an elephant is unwell, it is not just that individual we must care for, but the herd around her, missing her. Kham Kaew and Cartoon formed a friendship when they met at our sanctuary, and spend most of their time together, playing in mud baths, foraging, and ... eating each other's heads!

As always, we will provide updates with you, our supporters, when they become available 🩶

Drop a 🐘 to send Cartoon healing energy