Tucson's biggest baby is officially 1 year old and she's still as cute as ever

While the community celebrated Meru’s first birthday party with cookies, the 925-pound elephant celebrated with a 50-gallon rainbow popsicle filled with layers of frozen fruits and veggies.

“(The party) had all her favorite things — food, her family and balls for her to play with and climb over,” says lead zookeeper Shelby Maerling. “I think most of our photos are of her climbing and having the time of her life.”

Meru was born at Reid Park Zoo, 3400 E. Zoo Court, to African elephant Semba on March 8, 2024, joining an all-female herd of allomother Lungile and big sisters Nandi and Penzi. In October, 16-year-old male elephant Tsavo joined the herd.

“(Meru is) so confident. She’s always been confident but she’s really continued to blossom in that,” Maerling says. “She’s always felt comfortable adventuring and doing her own thing. She is very dialed-in and willing to problem-solve and figure things out. She is bold and confident, and I would say she’s often more patient than her sisters (when they were her age).”

Similar to Meru, Nandi, who is now 10 years old, was a very bold baby. Nandi was the first elephant born in Arizona and very quickly captured the hearts of Tucsonans.

“Nandi kinda had princess status as the first daughter. She had a different kind of experience because she didn’t have a big sister,” Maerling says. “(Nandi) was very bold and she has not lost that, but Meru has bigger sisters so she’s not bossing anyone around anytime soon. I think that translates to her having more confidence.”

Meru was fast to jump in the pool and slide around in the mud — Penzi, on the other hand, was far more timid as a baby. Penzi, who is almost 5 years old, didn’t get in the pool until her second birthday.

“(Meru) is definitely very social,” Maerling says. “Meeting Tsavo — she seamlessly goes to one member of the herd to the next. She’s quite the extrovert.”

Meru has also grown to become quite focused when it comes to her training sessions, which allow zoo staff to evaluate the health and well-being of the herd. Training sessions are voluntary and done through positive reinforcement.

Every elephant is different, though — even if you’re teaching them the same behavior, the approach will likely never be the same.

“There’s not the same recipe that’s just guaranteed to work — it requires you to reinvent yourself as a trainer and meet them at whatever their learning style is, so it requires a lot of adaptability and pivoting to whatever they’re showing works, and learning that. That’s always a challenge, but a good challenge that can only make us as a team and me as a trainer better.”

“(Meru) still has her moments and maybe gets distracted because there’s a ball or something she can’t possibly ignore, but by and large she’s become so much more focused from where we started when she was just an itty bitty thing,” Maerling says.

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Meru has learned how to hold her mouth open for a thermometer and how to present her ears. She’s learned about trunk washes, which is when saline is placed into an elephant’s trunk and blown out to be tested for viruses. She’s currently learning how to present her rump, which will allow keepers to check her feet and tail.

Her latest session is a lesson on swallowing pills, so if she ever needs to take medicine when she’s older, she’ll know how to do it.

“We have them swallow juice or water and we can put that in their mouths with a squirt bottle or what have you, just teaching them that we’re asking for that swallow reflex,” Maerling says. “We pair it with that whistle to show her she did the exact right thing.”

Eventually, they’ll give her an empty capsule and ask her to swallow it after she’s been given juice.

“Then, once you have them reliably swallowing, you can move onto a bigger capsule,” Maerling says. “We want to make sure they can swallow whatever the dose would be of a certain medicine.”

Something that’s remained true for much of her first year: Meru loves to play. She loves logs, balls and toys in her habitat, and she loves mud parties with her sisters. She also loves grapes — her favorite food, undeniably.

But Maerling’s favorite thing from the last year? Watching the herd get to know Meru, from Nandi who took on a nurturing and protective role to Penzi who became a big sister for the first time.

“I think just watching all of the herd welcome and embrace this new member is something that warms my heart,” Maerling says. “I’m really really fortunate and proud of the individual (Meru) is and our team in all that we’ve been able to teach her so far — but it’s not lost on me that she’s teaching us every day. If I look at the year as a whole, I’m so smitten with her and deeply appreciative of the lessons I’ve learned from her.”

But Meru’s first birthday is far more than a day on the calendar — it’s a celebration for elephants everywhere.

“I know everybody wants to make a big deal out of a 1-year-old’s birthday no matter the species, even humans do it, but I think with elephants, it’s important to celebrate every milestone,” Maerling says. “We know they are facing issues and being poached or encountering human-elephant conflict. They’re not necessarily reaching the birthdays we would like them to reach. Seeing her turn 1 and Penzi turn 5 — that’s really important, and seeing the community rally around that.

“We’re trying to make sure elephants have many more birthdays,” she says.

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