Cartoon, the elephant, has found the best way to relieve an itching was to rub her whole body against a tree.
The 58-year-old Asian elephant scratched thick mud on his body and legs before rubbing his head against a tree branch in a touching video.
Fiona Hardie filmed the scene at the new Samui Elephant Sanctuary in Koh Samui, Southern Thailand.
Cartoon lifted her left front leg to scratch her armpit before sliding her whole body down the tree to get her back leg.
She scratched her leg before turning and starting to rub behind her right ear.
Clearly enjoying herself with her mouth open, she scratched her head up and down.
She then walked over to the camera, rubbing her head against a tree branch while scratching her back leg.
Australian-born Fiona, who now lives in Hong Kong, said: “For me, beyond feeling pure fun, it’s really thinking about how Cartoon feels.
‘I believe elephants have the brains that exist to understand their plight. I love that she can just be an elephant, how it should be.”
Cartoon was rescued from a working life riding horses for tourists and will live comfortably in retirement at Sanctuary, with Asian elephants likely to live to 80 years old.
Fiona runs the social media platform Elephant Stories with Fiona, a Facebook page ‘dedicated to the love of elephants as sentient beings’.
She said: ‘I love this video. It gives me the opportunity to witness natural behavior by observing them, such as watching them scratch.
‘Every elephant has a story. I want to share this in the hope that we can all understand more about these sentient animals. ‘
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