An elephant calf enjoys a mud bath in the Shingwedzi River in the Kruger National Park, and shows his mother that he has mastered this technique … sort of.

Elephants communicate in many ways, including with very low frequency sounds ‒ even sometimes too low for the human ear to hear. The sounds are similar to the lowest notes of a pipe organ. These sounds are called infrasound and elephants can hear them for kilometres. Research has shown that the sounds are produced by the same physical mechanism as human speech or singing.

The footage was provided by Katie and André of Two-V Productions. Subscribe to their YouTube channel and follow their Facebook page  please. Books in their Op Vlerke series can be ordered from Kraal Uitgewers. The books, which are only available in Afrikaans, can also be found at shops in rest camps of the Kruger National Park.