Corn Washing in the River

Photograph taken by: Maxine Rawson-Rodriguez

The corn is cut every morning as a morning project for volunteers. After lunch, usually the same group will go down to the river to wash the corn. The elephants eat the corn stalks at around 5 o’clock, after their afternoon bath. Elephants only sleep four hours a night, so we have to make sure they have enough food to last them until morning.

There is pesticide on the corn stalks, so we have to rinse it in the river before we feed it to the elephants. The corn is already tied up in bundles, so we just throw it in the river.

We found that splitting up into two lines is the most productive way. We pass the bundles along until it reaches the end. Then a somebody will hoist it back to the truck. Some of the corn comes in bigger bundles and can be very heavy when they are waterlogged.

When all the work is done, we relax in the river to cool down and rest our backs. Water fights usually break out. The current isn’t very strong, but we will still find ourselves floating downstream a bit. The occasionally elephant watches us from the bank as they munch on leftover leaves that fell out of the bundles.

Photograph taken by: Maxine Rawson-Rodriguez

Kham Pan usually comes to this spot at least twice a day. I can find her here after afternoon chores and also after afternoon feeding time. Pon looks through the stalks to find corn that people missed. He will peel them and feed them to Kham Pan.