Corporate Info

Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage, just as the name suggests is an orphanage, nursery and captive breeding ground for Sri Lankan elephants located at Pinnawala. It's success and fame has travelled not just within the country but throughout the world to an extent where Pinnawala synonymous with the Sri Lankan Elephant. The orphanage was founded to care and protect the many orphaned unweaned wild elephants found wandering in and near the forests of Sri Lanka. It was established in 1975 by the Sri Lanka Department of Wildlife Conservation

Currently being a home to 93 elephants, Pinnawala at the time was a very remote area with lush coconut plantations and most importantly an area where the availability of mahouts was not lacking. Also the immense amount of water required by the elephants is supplemented with the availability of "Ma oya" running close by.

The Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage was first located at the Wilpattu National Park, then shifted to the tourist complex at Bentota and then to the Dehiwala Zoo. From the Zoo it was shifted to Pinnawala village on a 25-acre coconut plantation adjacent to the Maha Oya River.

At the time it was settled, the orphanage had five baby elephants which formed its nucleus. The addition of orphans continued till 1995 when the Elephant Transit Home (ETH) adjoining Udawalawe National Park was created by the Department of Wildlife Conservation. Since then, orphaned babies have been taken to the ETH and addition to the Pinnawala herd has been mostly through births occurring there.

The elephants are fed in their stalls. There is very little food they can gather from the premises of the orphanage except some grass. Large quantities of jackfruit, coconut, kitul (sugar palm), tamarind and grass, brought in daily, form the bulk of the elephants food. Each adult animal is given around 250 kilograms of this green matter per day and around 2 kg from a food bag containing rice bran and maize. It was planned for the facility to attract local and foreign visitors, the income from which would help to maintain the orphanage. All admission fees are used to look after the elephants. Visitors to the park can view the care and daily routine of the elephants, such as bottle feeding of elephant calves, feeding of all other elephants, and bathing in the Ma Oya (River).