Facts About Elephants.
Every time I come across an elephant, I have always equated their size as a moving House. You will be able to decipher what am talking about if you come close to a mature bull in his 40`s. I have been dissecting about elephant behaviour for a while now. And I will share with you some of the engrossing facts about Elephants.
Amboseli National Park where I have learned the top facts about elephants is the Home of Elephants in Africa after Chobe National Park in Botswana. Let’s now delve in and see these gripping facts.
13.) Elephants never Forget.
Elephants certainly have large brains (Scientists say it weighs up to 11 pounds, making it the largest land Mammals) which increase their memory capacity and aid in their complex patterns of communication.
They are believed to remember friends and enemies and can hold grudges for long. They exhibit substantial intelligence including, grief, altruism, mimicry just to mention a few.
12.) Calves gain Motion control 20 Minutes after Birth.
Incredible right? The calves weigh around 250 Pounds and can stand in the first 20 Minute after birth and gain Motion control after one hour.
This means Elephants can keep on migrating since the calves can keep up the motion of the herd after just two days after birth.
They are believed not to see well after birth but can recognize their mothers through touch, Smell, scent and sound.
Funnily and strangely you’re unlikely to see an elephant giving birth since 99% of the calves are born after dark, I think this is kind of a security mechanism.
11.) Facts About Elephant Tusks.
Elephant tusks have made thousands of Elephants to be butchered by the inhuman shitty poachers to trade them for money.
However, it is not as rampant, as some years ago. More strict Measures have been put in place.
Well, just like in humans, elephants prefer one tusk over the other and the preferred is known as the master tusk.
They use the tusks to protect themselves from potential predators like lions. They are also used for foraging, tripping tree barks and moving things like logs out of their way.
The tusks are enlarged incisors teeth that appear from the age of two years then continue growing to adulthood. At times they act as a female attraction to the males.
10.) Facts about Elephants Trunks.
The elephant Trunk is probably the most conspicuous body part. In my Native tribe, we have a saying that goes like (“Nzou Ndiemawa ni kukua Mowongo wayo”) Meaning An elephant never complain of carrying his trunk further explained as face your problems head-on, don`t chicken away.
The trunk is the most sensitive body part in an Elephant, boasting more than 150,000 muscles.
The trunks are used to snorkel whenever the elephants are swimming and just to note that they are good swimmers.
They are the only animals who can effortlessly swim across banks while fully submerged.
Thanks to the trunks, elephants have a great sense of scent, they can smell water a mile away and at the same time they use the trunk for testing, acting as tongue just like in humans.
What startled me the most, is that the elephant trunk can lift 770 Pounds at a go.
The African Elephant has two fingers at the tip of the trunk while the Asian has only one.
9.) The Facts about Elephants Ears.
We have two species of Elephants, African and Asian Elephants. Each has an Ear shape of the inhabitant continent map shape.
The ears are used for cooling as the African climate sometimes can be harsh, seemingly the African Elephant was purposely made for Africa.
The Elephants flap the ears to communicate either to signal aggressiveness or excitement or just to send a warning to the enemy. The Ears grow up to 7feet long and 5feet across.
8.) They are the world’s Largest Land Mammal.
I call them giants; they are incredibly huge!! They grow up to four meters making them the second tallest land mammals after giraffes which grow up to 6Meters.
However, they beat giraffes as the largest mammals on Earth since they weigh up to 6tonnes while giraffes can grow only up to 1.2tonnes.
The males reach their full height between 36 and 40 years this is more like half of their lifespan, these giants live up to 70 Years.
They can clear a field in just a few since they feed up to 235 Kilogram of vegetation per elephant in a day.
You can imagine a herd of elephants? We call it a clearing machine when it comes to eating.
7.) Facts About Elephants Skin.
They have one of the hardest skins on earth, according to elephant conservation, the skin can weigh up to 900 Kilograms.
They continue to say, the skin is not moist hence making the elephant have excess and loosely skin especially on the joints to allow movement.
The Skin of the elephant is grey but it depends on where the Elephants inhabit like the elephants in Samburu National Reserve Seem to be brownish because of the soil they roll and bathe in the mud.
The Mud protects the elephants from sunburns, cooling temperatures and protection from insects.
The Skin is about 2.5 Centimeters thick in most parts of the body and the wrinkles on the elephant skin make it retain water 10 times more than a flat or straight skin.
6.) Facts about Elephants Communication.
We all know Elephants don’t talk like humans do, right? Gotcha!! Just kidding, of course, they don`t talk but they communicate effectively through body language, signals and seismic vibrations.
According to science daily and I quote, “Elephants can communicate using very low-frequency sounds, with pitches below the range of human hearing.
These low-frequency sounds, termed “infrasounds,” can travel several kilometres, and provide elephants with a “private” communication channel that plays an important role in elephants’ complex social life.
Their frequencies are as low as the lowest notes of a pipe organ.” How that is even possible? We just let nature be.
5.) Facts About Elephants Eyes.
Elephants are partially blind, they can barely see past 25 feet, long. According to SeaWorld. Elephants are about 3.8 centimetres in diameter and their vision is moderate.
Nothing incredible about them. However, they don’t just rely on eyes only but also on their trunks.
There have been cases where blind matriarch has led herds of elephants, just fine since they do not need eyes that much.
Elephants have long eyelashes which prevent the eyes from debris, dust or mud while taking a mud bath.
4.) Facts about Elephants Diet.
I mentioned they can eat up to 250 pounds of vegetation in a day, these guys eat, they never stop eating to sustain their mass bodies. One elephant can destroy a whole season of farming in one night.
They feed on grasses, roots and tree barks. They rarely sleep and roam long distances foraging for food. Fortunately, most of the parks have more than enough food to sustain them, again nature knows how to balance.
3.) Facts about Elephants Herds.
Elephants are matriarch, meaning they are led by a female, which is the biggest and the oldest. They follow what she says and no one disobeys her.
The Males which are known as bulls roam on their own or form a loosely related herd. Once a male baby is born, he stays with the family through his adolescence then starts life on his own.
2.) Facts about Elephants Mating.
The bulls can only mate with the females when they are 25 and above when they are musth, they guard the females and mate only on oestrus period.
A bull on Musth can fight to death just to access the females. When the bull reaches the age of 25 Years, their testosterone levels shoot high, up to 6 times.
Mating takes place in about eight hours intervals. After conception, they take a gestation period of 22Months, almost two years.
This also explains their slow growth despite the poaching but again, let nature take its course.
1.) Elephants Under Threat.
The newest census did claim we only have around 400,000 remaining elephants across Africa and they are decreasing by 8% according to a study done in 2016.
Compounding the problem is how slow the Elephants reproduce. There are no enough calves to match the decreasing rate.
The shitty Poachers have continued to butcher these beautiful giants. Sometimes I wonder why lightning crush trees, thunder please listen to us, strike these shitty useless humans known as poachers. What wealth equate to killing these elephants REALLY?
Human encroachment, with the human population rising every year, we are having slow but sure wildlife-human conflicts.
Like I noted elephants can eat or destroy season land of farming in one night but in the real sense, it is us who are grabbing this wildlife land in the name of high population.
We should get off our filthy hands these National Parks and conservancies. I hope the future generation will be able to see Elephants.
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