LEO Project
Care for captive working elephants, ensuring they receive the love and affection they deserve.
Volunteering Activities
What We Need
- The first duty is to clean the elephant beds of old leaves, twigs and elephant dung.
- You will then join your elephant in the river and give them a good scrub with coconut husks.
- After a quick cup of tea, the mahouts will teach you to carry out basic medical checks on your elephant.
- After lunch the elephants will enjoy a second bath to cool them down.
- We like to include enrichment programmes in the afternoon, which are designed to stimulate and interest the elephants, such as hiding food in tyres
When & Who
What we Provide
The Volunteer house is a shared house located by the side of the river where the orphanage elephants take their daily dips. Mosquito nets and Clean bed linen will be provided.
Breakfast includes seasonal fruit, toast, local jams, eggs.
Lunch includes rice, chicken/fish, vegetables and greens.
Dinner includes bread, stew, soup, noodles or Sri Lankan Hoppers or Kothu ( shredded parata with chicken or fish and vegetables). Tea, coffee and drinking water is available throughout the day.
Our Fees
For volunteers looking to volunteer for over one month the fees would be GBP400 for the first week and GBP150 for each additional week. The placement fee includes:
Airport pickup/drop off
Starter pack
Full orientation
Three meals a day ( Monday to Friday)
Accomodation ( seven days a week)
24x7 incountry support
Certificate of completion
In house coordinator
We also offer one day elephant experiences for those visiting Sri Lanka with limited time to Volunteer. One days placement fee would be GBP50 which will include food and accomodation for one night.
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More Services we Offer
The placement fee covers:
Airport pick/drop off
Three meals a day ( Monday to Friday)
Accomodation
Full orientation
24x7 incountry support
Contact Person
Other Ways to Help
One day experience with the elephants start with cleaning the elephant beds and preparing them for later, feeding the elephants and getting in the river and washing the gentle giants. One day experience would include one nights accomodation and two meals.
Colouring pencils, art material, sports equipment such as basket balls, foot balls, cricket bats, board games, reading books.
Additional Info about Us
There are four beautiful elephants at our project; Kuwenie, Gal Kulama, Raja and Podi Raja. This project works towards promoting humane care for the working elephants of Sri Lanka. Elephant nutrition, health checks, enrichment programs are but a few areas which the project is focused on. Our aim is to have these working elephants settle into a retirement home at a certain age. We understand that in general the cost of maintaining captive elephants is very high and many elephant owners struggle and as a result the elephants are used for rides. Our charity ensures that the rides are done in an ethical way, where no howdhas are used to carry people and it is not just a life of work for the elephants. With the help of volunteers we are at present able to provide our four elephants with proper care making sure the welfare of these gorgeous animals are taken care of. Our final goal is to end a life of work for the captive elephants across Sri Lanka. The income generated from volunteers go directly towards the maintainance of these elephants, mahout salaries and the project at present which makes a big impact on the lives of these elephants and their keepers.
LEO honestly offers a lot more than they even advertise! Working with the elephants is such a rewarding job but on top of that I've also been able to immerse myself in the culture - going to see sporting events and traditional music shows and tasting every bit of food there is to try!
Working with the world's largest land mammal is the most amazing experience, especially the Sri Lankan elephants, with their patches of de-pigmentation and their very different personalities, you really get to know these gentle giants on a personal level, I honestly never want to leave.
LEO is a very close knit group of people who honestly just want to make the change we want to see in the world. I feel welcomed into a family and it is an experience i will treasure for a lifetime."