In South Africa, a Smart Gate Could Help Connect Elephants' Fragmented Habitat

An unlikely quartet’s clever contraption may allow the pachyderms to make better use of their range

Ed Stoddard, bioGraphic
June 24, 2025



The vision is to use the gate to create extended elephant migration routes that cut across South Africa, connecting green areas with navigation corridors that bypass cities and the rehabilitated gold mine dumps that ring Johannesburg. Paco Como/Shutterstock


What do a wildlife conservationist, a herd of trained elephants, a jazz composer and an architect have in common? In the South African bush, this unlikely quartet has banded together to develop an artificial intelligence-powered gate and sound system to help the region’s swelling elephant population make better use of its available range.

A two-hour drive north of Johannesburg, in South Africa’s rural Limpopo province, conservationist Sean Hensman runs a tourism enterprise called Adventures with Elephants on a small reserve. Here, Hensman keeps a herd of seven African savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana). These animals have been trained to tolerate tourists, journalists and even the odd scientific project, such as a 2010s-era effort by the U.S. military to develop the elephants’ bomb-sniffing capabilities.

But Hensman and his elephants’ latest project—the A.I.-powered gate—is an attempt to solve a persistent problem plaguing South Africa’s plentiful pachyderms.

In South Africa, all elephants are contained in fenced areas. “To mitigate human-wildlife conflict, we have fencing rules and, as a result, they can’t migrate,” says Hensman, who hails from Zimbabwe and grew up around African wildlife.

Across southern Africa, elephant populations are growing. Based on a 2024 study, the regional population has had small year-over-year growth since 2000 and today sits at around 290,000. South Africa’s elephant population is spread across 94 reserves, 76 of which are on private property or communally owned tribal lands. According to the national environment department, roughly 15,000 square miles—less than 3 percent of the country’s land—is available for the pachyderms.

More:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/in-south-africa-a-smart-gate-could-help-connect-elephants-fragmented-habitat-180986841/