Prince Harry and Meghan Markle share photos to mark World Elephant Day

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have shared more stunning unseen photos of their visit to Africa to mark World Elephant Day.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex shared the heartwarming images from their conservation trip to Botswana in 2017 on their Sussex Royal Instagram page, which has 9.3million followers.

Their post, which garnered 90,665 likes in less than an hour, featured a picture of Prince Harry walking towards a large elephant in the bush and a shot of Meghan’s hands cradling an elephant’s trunk. 

The duchess is wearing a stunning silver elephant hair bangle on her left wrist.

The royal couple travelled to Botswana months before announcing their engagement, with the trip being described as ‘crucial’ in allowing them to grow their bond.

While there they became very involved with the organisation Elephants Without Borders, and helped Dr Mike Chase who works for the charity. 

They told how they were sharing the photos to announce that the awareness created from their environment post last month has already been of huge benefit to EWB.

The caption read: ‘Today is World Elephant Day and we are pleased to announce that since we followed our friends at @ElephantsWithoutBorders (EWB) on Instagram in July, when we were celebrating the environment, you and our friend @TheEllenFund (@TheEllenShow) have spread the word and EWB have been able to help protect 25 elephants by fitting them with satellite navigation collars!

The post included this shot of Meghan’s hands cradling an elephant’s trunk. The Duchess is wearing a stunning silver elephant hair bangle

Their post on the Sussex Royal Instagram page, which has 9.3million followers, garnered 90,665 likes in less than an hour

‘These collars allow the team at EWB to track the elephants, as well as to learn their essential migratory patterns to keep their corridors safe and open so future generations of elephants can roam freely. In honour of this amazing support, EWB have named their most recently collared Elephant… ELLEN! We can’t wait to see where she will go!

‘Two years ago on World Elephant Day, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex joined Dr Chase to help in this conservation effort. Below, a few words from Mike and his partner Kelly at EWB:

‘”Today is a day to honor and celebrate the majestic elephant and to make a strong stand for conserving and protecting one of the world’s most beloved animals. 

In a previous post, the couple shared a photograph of them fixing a satellite tracking collar to an elephant

‘Elephants are intelligent, sentient beings capable of emotions from joy to grief. They are “environmental engineers”, a key-stone umbrella species, and the fight to save them is in effect, a fight to save entire ecosystems and all wildlife.

‘Today elephants are facing many challenges; habitat loss and competition for resources creates conflict with humans, climate change and fires destroy much needed resources and poaching for the demand of ivory makes elephants bigger targets than ever.

‘African elephants are especially prone to human-wildlife conflict because of their large home ranges. 

‘Finding, preserving and creating elephant corridors is therefore of great importance in helping to maintain habitats suitable for movement and minimising human-elephant conflict. 

‘Corridors are a mitigation technique to better the livelihoods of local communities and the elephants themselves, by providing environment and ample space for wildlife to navigate from one habitat patch to another, without affecting the livelihoods of communities.”‘