Elephant

We explain everything about the elephant, its reproduction, feeding, habitat, and other characteristics. Also, what types of elephants exist.

Elephants are the largest land animals that exist.

What are elephants?

Elephants are a family of large quadrupedal mammals, famous for their large ears and prehensile trunk, as well as their long, white ivory tusks, as well as for being the largest land animals in the world today.

Currently, three different species of elephants are known, each with their respective subspecies, and there are paleontological remains of extinct species, such as mammoths.

The immediate ancestors of these animals arose around 50 to 60 million years ago and were particularly successful in colonizing all continents and habitats except Antarctica and Australia. Eventually, an ancestor known as palaeomastodon, which lived 40 to 25 million years ago, spawned the various species of elephants we know today.

Human beings have known elephants since ancient times and in certain geographies, they were domesticated and incorporated into productive work, or used as a war mount. For example, the historical episode of the war between Ancient Rome and Carthage (known as the Punic Wars) is famous, in which Hannibal, the Phoenician general, crossed the Alps to invade Rome with an army mounted on elephants.

 

characteristics of elephants

Elephants usually cover themselves with a film of mud that protects them from sunlight.

In general, elephants are characterized by the following:

• They are bulky animals, whose bodies can measure about 4 meters high and weigh several tons(on average, about 7500 kg). Its brain, the largest of all land animals, weighs only 5 kg and gives the elephant an intelligence comparable to that of a cetacean or some primates.
• Its trunk, the best-known feature of the species, has thousands of muscles(40,000 or 100,000 according to different sources) and is a sensitive extension of the nose, capable of perceiving an immense range of distant odors (elephants have the best sense of smell in all species), pick up food from the ground, suck up and pour water into their mouths or onto their body to cool off, or emit sounds of a diverse range, including infrasonic ones.
• At the same time, they have huge pinnae, which allows them a keen sense of hearing. Instead, they have poor vision, with their eyes on the sides of their heads, which makes them particularly sensitive to sharp and sudden movements, to which they usually respond aggressively.
• The males of the species have two gigantic ivory tusks, an extension of their incisor teeth, which protrude from their upper jaw and which these animals use to make their way through the thicket, dig into the ground, mark their territory, or attack and defend themselves, in case it is necessary. Composed of ivory, they have been highly prized throughout history and are one reason why they have been hunted so extensively.
• Their skin is thick and wrinkled, grayish or brownish in color, and they have sparse, sparse fur. To avoid dehydration, they usually spend a lot of time in the water and cover themselves with a film of mud that protects them from sunlight.
• They are traditionally credited with a good memory, which appears to be true, and are known to possess rich social interaction, with abundant gestures of empathy, compassion, play, primitive use of tools, and self-recognition.
• It is also said that they are afraid of mice (which is totally false) and that they constitute their own cemeteries. The latter may be a misinterpretation of the fact that dying elephants instinctively seek water, which is why they tend to leave their bodies in similar regions. However, elephants have been seen to recognize the remains of their species among those of others, and play with them as if paying them some kind of homage.

Where do elephants live?

Current species of elephants live in warm areas of forests, grasslands, and savannahs, in Africa and certain regions of Asia such as India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam. In fact, it is usual to distinguish between the species according to their usual home of residence: African elephants and Asian elephants, since they have different physical features.

The elephants live in herds, led by the oldest females, that is, the matriarchs and the herds are made up of several family groups, in which there are usually between two and eight individuals.

What do elephants eat?

Elephants are herbivores, their diet consisting primarily of grasses, seeds, bark, and other plant fibers.

How do elephants reproduce?

Newborn elephants weigh more than 100 kilograms.

Like the rest of the mammals, elephants reproduce sexually and viviparously, but they have long gestation periods (in some species they can reach 22 months, and once every four or five years) at the end of which a single is born. calf, whose initial weight ranges from 118 kg.

Elephants are very jealous of their young, and in a herd, there can be between 20 and 40 matriarchs with their respective young. Males, on the other hand, leave the herd early, between 10 and 14 years of age.

How long do elephants live?

The average life expectancy of the elephant ranges between 60 and 80 years of age.

types of elephants

As we said before, elephants are classified into three species, grouped into two different genera, which we can summarize as follows:

• African elephants(genus Loxodonta ) – two distinct species, which are the African bush elephant ( Loxodonta africana ), and the African bush elephant ( Loxodonta cyclotis ).
• Asian elephants(genus Elephas ) – a single species that is further classified into three current subspecies: the Sri Lankan elephant ( Elephas maximus Maximus ), the Indian elephant ( Elephas maximus indicus ), and the Sumatran elephant ( Elephas maximus sumatranus ).

It is important to note that in some zoological classifications, a distinction is made between the Indian elephant ( Elephas maximus indicus ) and two other subspecies: the Borneo elephant ( Elephas maximus borneensis ) and the Malaysian elephant ( Elephas maximus hirsutus ). But there is still debate in the scientific community about it.

 

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