AWARE Trust
In June 2016 a wild bull elephant known as Pretty Boy, who had been wandering Zimbabwe's Mana Pools National Park for weeks with a bullet wound in his forehead, walked calmly up to a vehicle carrying wildlife vets and let them treat him. The shot had struck too high to kill him. Instead the bullet glanced off his skull, broke delicate bones in his sinuses and left an infected wound that would likely have worsened without help.
The vets came from AWARE, the Animal and Wildlife Area Research and Rehabilitation Trust, a Zimbabwean veterinary charity. Their photos and updates, shared on the trust's Facebook page and picked up by news outlets around the world, turned Pretty Boy into one of the best-known elephant patients of that year. Here is what happened, how the treatment worked and what the case says about the wider pressure on Africa's elephants.
An injured bull who came to the vets
AWARE Trust
Rangers and visitors had noticed the elephant with a hole in his forehead some time before help arrived. When vets Dr Lisa Marabini and Dr Keith Dutlow reached the park on 13 June 2016, they did not have to track him through the bush. According to AWARE's account, the bull came to them within about half an hour and stood close to their car, relaxed enough for them to get a good look at the wound.
It is tempting to say he knew he was asking for help, and that is how many headlines told the story. Scientists are more cautious. Elephants in protected areas often become used to vehicles, and a calm, tolerant animal can look like one seeking aid. What is clear is that his gentle temperament made a difficult job much safer for everyone.
What the X-ray showed
AWARE Trust
AWARE Trust
Treating a six-tonne patient starts with sedation. The team darted Pretty Boy and, once he was down, kept him on his side with his trunk clear so he could breathe, monitoring him throughout. Then they used a portable X-ray machine to see inside his head.
AWARE Trust
The image showed a "mushroomed" bullet lying under the skin about 5 cm from the open wound. On its way, it had fractured the turbinate bones in his sinuses, thin scrolls of bone that help warm and filter air. Cloudiness in nearby sinuses suggested pus, a sign of infection.
The bullet itself was not the main concern. Dr Marabini explained that bullets are often left in place, because bullets are usually sterile when they penetrate tissue as they generate so much heat
. The danger was the dead, broken bone around the wound, which can keep an infection going for months.
How the vets treated him
AWARE Trust
The team cleaned out the wound and removed the fragments of dead bone so the body could heal from the inside. They then gave antibiotics to fight the infection and treatment against parasites, which can easily take hold in an open wound.
They also found an abscess on his shoulder. Dr Marabini believed the shooter had fired a second time, aiming for the heart, and missed. Both injuries point to a deliberate attempt to kill him, and in her view he had survived by a narrow margin. As she put it in reports at the time, He was lucky.
The vets suspected he had been shot outside the park boundary and moved into Mana Pools as a refuge. Whether the shooter was a poacher or a hunter who wounded him and failed to follow up has never been established.
Waking up and recovery
AWARE Trust
Once the reversal drug was given, Pretty Boy got back on his feet. He then rested for about half an hour with his head leaning against a tree, a sleepy pause that made one of the most shared photos of the rescue.
AWARE Trust
Dr Marabini later described how unusually peaceful he had been throughout, saying he literally emanated serenity
. The vets planned follow-up checks while he recovered in the park, and reports at the time said he was on the mend.
Why elephants are still being shot
Pretty Boy's injury is part of a much larger problem. Elephants are killed for their ivory, and they are also shot in conflict with farmers whose crops they raid, by poorly managed hunts, and occasionally in self-defence. Older articles about this story warned that African elephants could be extinct within ten years. That did not happen, but the decline has been severe.
In March 2021 the International Union for Conservation of Nature assessed Africa's two elephant species separately for the first time. It listed the African forest elephant as Critically Endangered, after a fall of more than 86% over 31 years, and the African savanna elephant as Endangered, after a drop of at least 60% over 50 years. Numbers fell sharply after 2008, when poaching surged, with a peak around 2011. Poaching and the loss of habitat to farming remain the main threats.
There is some good news. Where parks are well protected and communities benefit from wildlife, elephant numbers have stabilised or grown. Mana Pools, a UNESCO World Heritage Site on the Zambezi River, remains one of the places where visitors can see bulls like Pretty Boy up close.
How people can help
- Support field vets and rangers. Groups such as the AWARE Trust treat injured wildlife, and you can contribute through their support page.
- Never buy ivory. Demand for ivory drives poaching, even when products are labelled antique.
- Travel responsibly. Wildlife tourism that pays local communities gives them a reason to protect elephants.
- Share accurate stories. Stories like this one draw attention to conservation, especially when the facts are right.
Pretty Boy's calm trust in the people who treated him is what made his story famous. The work of the vets who answered the call is what saved him.
Sources: The Daily Star, 21 June 2016; IUCN Red List update on African elephants, March 2021; AWARE Trust. Photos courtesy of the AWARE Trust. Story first shared by The Dodo and True Activist.
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