Tucson's 4-month-old elephant loves rolling in mud and sipping on Gatorade

If you look up rankings of the best Gatorade flavors, you’ll often find lemon-lime, orange, glacier freeze and cool blue among the top picks.

Meru could not disagree more.

Reid Park Zoo’s 545-pound elephant calf will continue to nurse for years to come, but she’s spent the last month indulging in a couple of our favorite snacks: fruit punch-flavored Gatorade and bits of watermelon.

Meru was born at Reid Park Zoo, 3400 E. Zoo Court, on March 8. She joins mama Semba, allomother Lungile and big sisters 9-year-old Nandi and 4-year-old Penzi.

For all five elephants, zoo staff facilitate training sessions to ensure the health and wellbeing of the herd — it’s voluntary for the elephants and always done through positive reinforcement.

“We’re teaching (Meru) to use her trunk to interact with us in a safe way and take the reinforcement we’re giving her to try to put it in her mouth,” says elephant care specialist Mara Eisenbarth. Reinforcements could include carrots, cucumbers or elephant pellets — basically kibble for elephants, packed with nutrients and vitamins.

“Right now she’s really interested in watered-down Gatorade,” Eisenbarth says. “We have little bowls. If she touches her trunk to our hand, we’ll give her a little bowl of Gatorade.”

The whole herd is a fan of the fruit punch flavor — they don’t like orange or the blue flavors, but staff keeps them on hand just in case Meru changes her mind.

“For the most part, she’s trying to use her trunk to pick things up and put in her mouth, which is hard for baby elephants because it’s a little bit of a spaghetti noodle but it’s getting to be a more coordinated effort,” Eisenbarth says.

As Meru is getting familiar with using her trunk, one of the things the 4-month-old loves is when keepers cup water in their hands so she can suck it up.

“You feel the suction of her little trunk in your hand,” Eisenbarth says. “It’s one of those things that makes your day.”

Beyond the Gatorade, Meru is also interested in ice cubes and chopped-up pieces of watermelon, though she’s still face planting into food as she learns how to eat it.

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

Since Meru was only a week old, she’s loved rolling around in mud — and that certainly hasn’t changed as she has now started to explore the “big kid wallow” as the keepers call it. (Zoo staff recently put a new kind of clay inside the mud wallows, so if you see a red-covered Meru running around the habitat, that’s why.)

“Lately, she got into the big wallow, which we make sure is safe for her, but Semba and all the other elephants are very attentive, too,” Eisenbarth says. “It’s an exciting milestone for her and it gives her another opportunity to stay cool. It’s also really fun to watch — the wallow is a social thing for elephants. It’s like a watering hole.”

Oftentimes, when one elephant starts to wallow, another will join in.

“(Meru) is a little social butterfly these days and is getting a lot of time with the whole herd,” Eisenbarth says. “Semba has taken that time for much-needed naps during the day and Meru is being babysat by Lungile and her two sisters.”

Social interaction is important for elephants, and Semba is choosing to take some time away from Meru to allow the baby to play with the rest of the herd.

“Nandi loves (Meru) and she’ll let her use the shade of her body to keep her cool,” Eisenbarth says. “With Penzi, (Meru) is really starting to play and get into those play sessions and Penzi is letting her do that.”

When Meru was born, Penzi wasn’t her little sister’s biggest fan, but that's improving month by month. You might even see the calf sticking her trunk into the mouths of other elephants, including Penzi — it's a social greeting that also teaches Meru what kinds of foods are appropriate to eat.

“(Penzi is) learning that Meru is not as scary as she thought and that she can still get attention from the herd members and that they don’t have to compete as much,” Eisenbarth says.

And if you hear a little squeak of a trumpet next time you visit the zoo, it just might be baby Meru.

“All of the elephants get a little startled when a bird lands too close to them or a squirrel runs by, and Meru did that recently,” Eisenbarth says. “She let out a little trumpet, a little squeak, and kinda moved away from what she got startled by. She’s learning to use her ears to show she’s a big elephant and trying to scare something away. The little squeaky trumpets are still happening and they’re so cute.”