Watch These Elephants Play With a New Toy at Their Sanctuary [VIDEO]

Recycled tires have enjoyed new life as children’s toys for generations. Simple, durable, and versatile, they can be turned into swings, rolled around, or placed flat on the ground to make an obstacle course.

Elephants at Elephant Nature Park in Thailand received an abundance of recycled tires to play with, and they’ve been using them in a variety of ways, just like children do. Of course, the elephants are much too large to fit their bodies in a tire swing, but they swing them with their trunks and kick at them with their limbs. Elephants of all ages have fun rolling the tires on the ground, stepping into the holes, and squishing them down to watch them pop back into shape.

We recently shared an earlier video of sanctuary elephants playing with a different enrichment toy — a rubber ball. But instead of balancing awkwardly on it as elephants do at the circus, a group got together and played a game of soccer. It’s much more fun watching elephants be themselves than forced into performing unnatural tricks.

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