Elephants are some of the most magnificent animals on the planet. They live in zoos, sanctuaries, and in the wild as some of the smartest and most self-aware animals in the world, next to humans, apes, and dolphins. Elephants are dying out at an alarming rate, both in African and Asian countries due to illegal poaching and habitat loss. According to statistics gathered by CNN and the World Wildlife Fund, African elephants could be extinct as early as 2020, with different subsets of Asian elephants following behind not long afterward. These unique creatures are intelligent, empathetic, and important to our ecosystems and we must not let them go extinct. Here are some interesting facts about elephants that may make you want to pay more attention to this cause.
1. Elephants can recognize themselves in a mirror.
Most animals are not able to do this. Recognizing oneself in a mirror demonstrates a sense of self-awareness and sentience on a higher level than simpler animals. There are only nine organisms known to have this level of self-awareness, including humans and elephants. This sort of intelligence is worth keeping around.
2. They are empathetic.
Most scientists argue that animals are not capable of feeling emotions, let alone feeling empathy toward other animals. Female elephants are very social animals and form herds lead by a matriarch. They have been known to comfort each other when one is in distress or dying, have huge displays of joy at seeing companions, at births of new babies in the herd, and are thought to have chronic stress due to generations and generations of poaching and habitat loss.
3. Elephants mourn their dead companions.
Researchers have observed elephants crying when their family members die. They've also been known to gather entire herds around a single dead member to mourn their loss. Some even stay with the body, stroking it with their trunks or touching it with their feet, not wanting to leave their companion. Sometimes when elephants are close to death, they will even go to a specific place to die, where their family's remains are, almost like an elephant graveyard. Other elephants from their herds even go to these "graveyards" and will turn over bones and study them, mourning their lost ones and recognizing who they were.
4. Elephants in the wild can live to be between 60 and 70 years old, on average.
The oldest elephant was an Asian elephant named Lin Wang who lived to be 86 years old.
5. Elephants have strong family bonds.
The older females in a herd will help to take care of new babies together and form strong bonds between each other. Although most male elephants go off to live on their own once they reach adulthood, females stay together in herds, helping each other through life for generations.
6. They spend up to 16 hours eating per day.
Since they are the largest land mammals, they need a lot of food to sustain them. They only sleep for about four hours a day.
7. Elephants are important contributors to helping forests in the Congo and throughout Asia.
Studies show that forest elephants are actually more responsible than birds,, primates, and insects when it comes to spreading seeds in the forests of the Congo and in southern Asia. Without the elephants to help with seed dispersion, it is likely these important forests will suffer immensely. Dying elephants = dying trees = less oxygen.
8. Their skin is so sensitive that they can feel a fly land anywhere on their massive bodies.
Not only are they emotionally and mentally sensitive, but also physically. If these giants can feel a single fly, how must poaching feel?
9. An elephant's gestational period is 22 months long.
Elephants only have one baby at a time, although twins have been recorded but are extremely rare. Although elephants live a long time and can reproduce up until about the age of 50, this makes their reproduction rate slower than the rate they are dying.
10. Elephants are being born tuskless more than ever.
Due to poaching for ivory, elephants are evolving to be born without tusks at all. This is still dangerous to elephants because they use their tusks to lift things, get bark off of trees, attract mates, and dig for food and water, among other things. It is mostly females being born without tusks, which is saving them from being hunted, but is still detrimental to populations because males are dying out faster than they can reproduce.
11. Ivory is made of dentine--the same substance any other tooth--and possesses no special qualities.
Ivory has been sought after for hundreds of years due to superstitions that surround it and the coveted ivory is used to make expensive decorations and piano keys. The truth of the matter is, though, ivory is just a tooth. It is not magical or special. The only thing that needs an elephant tusk is an elephant!
12. They actually do have great memories.
It is scientifically proven that elephants actually do have great memories and can remember another elephant for many years after being separated. They also can remember how a human has treated them and will treat the human how it treated them when it sees them again. The old saying "an elephant never forgets" is true. Do we really want them to remember us as the species that is leading to their demise?
13. You can help the elephants!
You might be saying "well, how can I help?" There are sanctuaries that accept volunteer help, the most notable ones being in Thailand, such as The Wildlife Friends Foundation Thailand, Elephant Nature Park, and Elephant Jungle Sanctuary. Since many of us are not able to just get on a plane and go devote our lives to saving the elephants, there are a few things you can do from home, too. You can donate money to http://savetheelephants.org or you can "adopt an elephant" from the World Wildlife Foundation and get a stuffed elephant that symbolizes the elephants your money is going to help save. There is also a company called Ivory Ella that sells clothes with elephants on them and is partnered with the Save the Elephants organization in which a portion of the proceeds goes toward helping to end ivory trade.
Other than the occasional lion going after a weak or baby elephant, humans are the elephants' only predator, which means only we can save them. It's on us.
