An elephant has given birth to female twins in Kenya's Samburu National Reserve, a UK-registered Nairobi-based conservation organization, Save the Elephants, shared good news on X (formerly Twitter) on Friday.
The recent birth of twin elephants comes approximately two years following the birth of two successive babies by Bora from the Winds elephant family for the first time in decades, the organization said.
"Hooray! Yet another set of twins (both female) have been born in Samburu National Reserve almost two years after Bora from the Winds gave birth to twins for the first time in decades. Meet Alto’s double joy who were first spotted by our researchers this week," the organization wrote on X.
The birth of twin elephant calves is truly a rare event, as not every pair of twins survives. In 2006, for instance, twins born in Samburu died shortly after birth, according to media reports.
Kenya is home to 36,280 elephants, according to data from the first national census of all the country's wildlife in 2021. This represents a 12% increase in the population since 2014.
Despite this progress, elephants still face risks, including by hunting for ivory. Thus, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature estimates "at least 20,000 African elephants are killed illegally for their tusks" every year.