These baby elephants enjoy splashing around and playing in the mud with a bit of help from their parents.
The African elephants repeatedly brushed themselves off in the muddy water as they were desperate to cool down.
In particular, two elephant calves—thought to be just four months old—completely submerged themselves in a waterhole.
And at one point, a member of the older elephant herd of 50 gave one of the youngsters a helping hand and cuddled it in the mud using its trunk.
In temperatures just under 30 degrees Celsius, the elephants find the mud cools them down, protecting them from the sun’s rays.
What’s more, the drying mud also provides a layer of protection from insect bites.
Wildlife photographer Mike Dexter, who works for a safari company, spotted the elephant herd in the Mashatu Game Reserve in Botswana.
He was leading a couple of South African visitors through the reserve and managed to get within five meters of the great animals.
Mike, 27, who lives on the Mashatu Reserve, said: After waiting for over two hours for the elephants to arrive, I saw them coming up the hill.
‘The herd was making a lot of high-pitched trumpeting noises while they splashed around in the mud hole.
After one particularly aggressive trunk flick, a shower of mud sprayed over the two South Africans I was with and drenched their gear.
I was fortunate enough to have avoided being sprayed by their shower.
‘I was silently laughing my head off as I had to try and keep quiet when I was in such close proximity to these massive creatures.
‘Fortunately, the two people with me found it funny and were laughing as well– it’s rare to get sprayed by mud from a wild elephant.
The wildlife snapper added: ‘I was delighted with how the pictures came out and I was excited to show people how much fun I’d had.
‘My favorite is the one with the female and youngster both with their trunks in the air and mud going everywhere.
‘I’ve never seen an elephant image like this, and I really like the way it looks like they’re doing a kind of synchronized dance.
