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Elephant Facts
* Recent DNA testing has split the African elephant species in two, the African Bush and the African
Forest elephant. The Forest elephant is much smaller, has a longer jaw, rounder ears and different tusks than the Bush elephant.
*
Average life span is up to 70 years, size: Height at the shoulder, 8.2 to 13 ft (2.5 to 4 m), Weight: 5,000 to 14,000 lbs
(2,268 to 6,350 kg)
* Their gestation period is 22 months - the longest pregnancy of any land animal. Baby elephants
can weigh as much as 120kg (265lb).
* An elephant's trunk is an extension of its upper lip and nose, and contains around 40.000
individual muscles. Both types of African elephants have two finger-like nodules at the end of their trunks. Elephants use their
trunks for many things, including gathering food and social interaction - elephants that know each other will often entwine their
trunks as a sign of greeting.
* Matriarchs in particular have a social memory whereby they are able to remember old
faces. This skill can be vital to the survival of the herd; when the female elephants encounter other individuals they do not recognise,
family members bunch together defensively to protect their young.
* Elephants are magnificent swimmers. They use all four
legs to swim and are able to move swiftly, their body mass providing flotation while their trunk acts like a snorkel. They can even
swim long distance.
* Lungs - The respiratory system of the elephant is quite exceptional in a number of ways. The
elephant lacks a pleural cavity. This means the lungs are directly attached to the walls of the chest cavity and to the diaphragm.
Thus respiratory movements are solely dependent on chest musculature, since there is no mechanism of inflating the lungs by negative
pressure in the pleural cavity as is usual in mammals. As a result of this unique physiology, the elephant would find it difficult
to breathe if any restraint or pressure is placed on the movement of the chest and diaphragm, essentially over time suffocating from
its own tremendous weight.
Air enters the lungs through internal nares which are located high on the forehead. The position
of the nares is indicated by the plate-size circle of skin.
An elephant can breathe through its mouth as well as through its trunk,
so it can retain water or dust in the trunk without having to hold its breathe.
* The tusks, another remarkable feature,
are greatly elongated incisors (elephants have no canine teeth); about one-third of their total length lies hidden inside the skull.
The largest tusk ever recorded weighed 214 pounds and was 138 inches long. Tusks of this size are not found on elephants in Africa
today, as over the years hunters and poachers have taken animals with the largest tusks. Because tusk size is an inherited characteristic,
it is rare to find one now that would weigh more than 100 pounds.
* Both male and female African elephants have tusks. Tusks
grow for most of an elephant's lifetime and are an indicator of age. Elephants are "right- or left-tusked," using the favored tusk
more often as a tool, thus, shortening it from constant wear. Tusks will differ in size, shape and direction; researchers use them
(and the elephant's ears) to identify individuals.
* The teeth are interesting and ultimately determine the natural
life span of the elephant. The cheek teeth erupt in sequence from front to rear (12 on each side, six upper and six lower), but with
only a single tooth or one and a part of another, being functional in each half of each jaw at one time. As a tooth becomes badly
worn, it is pushed out and replaced by the next tooth growing behind. These large, oblong teeth have a series of cross ridges across
the surface. The last molar, which erupts at about 25 years, has the greatest number of ridges but must also serve the elephant for
the rest of its life. When it has worn down, the elephant can no longer chew food properly; malnutrition sets in, hastening the elephant's
death, usually between 60 and 70 years of age.
* The African elephant's ears are over twice as large as the Asian elephant's
and have a different shape, often described as similar to a map of Africa. The nicks, tears and scars as well as different vein patterns
on the ears help distinguish between individuals. Elephants use their ears to display, signal or warn when alarmed or angry, they
spread the ears, bringing them forward and fully extending them. The ears also control body temperature. By flapping the ears on hot
days, the blood circulates in the ear's numerous veins; the blood returns to the head and body about 9 F cooler.
* The sole
of the elephant's foot is covered with a thick, cushionlike padding that helps sustain weight, prevents slipping and deadens sound.
When they need to, elephants can walk almost silently. An elephant usually has five hoofed toes on each forefoot and four on each
hind foot. When it walks, the legs on one side of the body move forward in unison.
* Elephants can walk at about 5 miles per
hour for hours on end.
* Tusks continued to grow throughout the elephant's life.
* Elephants walk well-worn trails that
have been used for centuries. These trail lead to favorite watering places. The ability to find water is critical to their survival.
*
Patterns on the bottom of an elephant's foot are as individualistic as a human's fingerprints.
* Elephants eat roots, grasses,
fruit, and bark, and they eat a lot of these things. An adult elephant can consume up to 300 pounds (136 kilograms) of food in a single
day.
DIET
An elephant's day is spent eating (about 16 hours), drinking, bathing, dusting, wallowing, playing and resting (about three
to five hours). As an elephant only digests some 40 percent of what it eats, it needs tremendous amounts of vegetation (approximately
5 percent of its body weight per day) and about 30 to 50 gallons of water. A young elephant must learn how to draw water up into its
trunk and then pour it into its mouth. Elephants eat an extremely varied vegetarian diet, including grass, leaves, twigs, bark, fruit
and seed pods. The fibrous content of their food and the great quantities consumed makes for large volumes of dung.
CARING for
the Young
Usually only one calf is born to a pregnant female. An orphaned calf will usually be adopted by one of the family's
lactating females or suckled by various females. Elephants are very attentive mothers, and because most elephant behavior has to be
learned, they keep their offspring with them for many years. Tusks erupt at 16 months but do not show externally until 30 months.
The calf suckles with its mouth (the trunk is held over its head); when its tusks are 5 or 6 inches long, they begin to disturb the
mother and she weans it. Once weaned usually at age 4 or 5, the calf still remains in the maternal group.
