BEIJING -- Already famous at home, China's wandering elephants are now becoming international stars.
Major global media are chronicling the herd's more than yearlong, 300-mile trek from its home in a wildlife reserve in mountainous southwest Yunnan province to the outskirts of the provincial capital of Kunming.
Twitter and YouTube are full of clips of the elephants' antics, particularly those of two calves that slipped into an irrigation ditch and had to be helped out by older members of the group.
The elephants have been trending for days on China's Weibo microblogging service, with photos of the sleeping group attracting 25,000 posts and 200 million views Monday night.
The 15-member herd has been caught by security cameras trotting down urban streets at night, has been filmed constantly from the air by more than a dozen drones, and has been followed by those seeking to minimize damage and keep both pachyderms and people out of harm's way.
The elephants have raided farms for food and water, visited a car dealership and even showed up at a retirement home, where they poked their trunks into some of the rooms, prompting one man to hide under his bed.
While no animals or people have been hurt, reports put damage to crops at more than $1 million.
Sixteen animals were originally in the group, but the government said two returned home and that a baby was born during the walk. The herd is now composed of six female and three male adults, three juveniles and three calves, according to official reports.
What exactly motivated them to make the journey remains a mystery, although they appear to be especially attracted to corn, tropical fruit and other crops that are tasty, plentiful and easy to obtain in the lush tropical region that is home to about 300 of the animals. Others have speculated that their leader may be simply lost.
Asian elephants are loyal to their home ranges unless there have been disturbances, loss of resources or development, in which case they may move out, according to Nilanga Jayasinghe, manager for Asian species conservation at the World Wildlife Fund.
"In this case, we don't really know why they left their home range, but do know that there has been significant habitat loss due to agriculture and conversion of forests into plantations within that range in the last few decades," Jayasinghe wrote in an email. "What possibly happened here is that in their search for new habitat, they got lost along the way and kept going."
Authorities have been working to avoid negative interactions and "must determine what the best next steps here are and keep human-elephant conflict at bay," Jayasinghe wrote.
Elephants are given the top level of protection in China, allowing their numbers to steadily increase even as their natural habitat shrinks, and requiring farmers and others to exercise maximum restraint when encountering them.
As of Tuesday, the herd members remained on the outskirts of Kunming, a city of 7 million people, with one of the males having moved away on his own, creating even more excitement -- and worry -- for those attempting to keep tabs on them.
A statement Monday from a provincial command center set up to monitor the group said the elephants appeared to be resting. More than 410 emergency response personnel and police personnel, scores of vehicles and 14 drones were deployed to monitor them.
