African Elephant Research Paper

I. HABITAT FACTS

African Elephants are herbivores, which means that they eat plants in order to survive.

African Elephants eat roots, grasses, fruit, bark, broadleaved trees, shrubs, palms, vines, leaves, shoots, twigs, branches, and flowers in order to survive and can consume up to 300 pounds of food per day.

An unusual feeding habit the African Elephant has is that they spend more time looking for food then sleeping, spending up to twenty hours searching. They are almost constantly searching because they need to find enough food to sustain their massive bodies.

African Elephants mainly live in West African rainforests, Central African rainforests, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Sahel desert in Mali.

The conditions the African Elephant

needs to survive is an open grassy or vegetation filled environment with water sources in order to eat sustain its body mass and to stay hydrated.

African Elephants do not really live under a home for protection but they live in tree savannas, floodplain grassland, deserts, evergreen rainforest, most semi-deciduous forests, woodlands, and grassland margins.

African Elephants have a tendency to form large herds, especially during seasonal migrations.

Female elephants tend to herd in families with their children to protect their children, while adult male elephants tend to rome on their own.

II. ANIMAL ADAPTATIONS

The African Elephant uses its tusks and trunk as a tool to help survive in its environment. Its tusks are used to dig for food, water, and strip bark from trees. Its trunk is used to grab potential meals, like fruits in trees or on the floor. African Elephants also use their tusks for self defence, attacking any hostile predators.

A way in which the African Elephant is unique is that they lover showering themselves with water by sucking water into their trunks. After that they spray a coating of dust on their skin for protection from bugs.

The African Elephant are the largest land animals on earth and grow to 8.2 to 13 feet tall. Their ears are large, floppy, and somewhat look like the continent of Africa. They have wide and thick legs as well as long trunks.

A Calf is born through the mother Elephant. The African Elephant’s reproduction is very slow and a female gives birth only four to five years. It takes almost 22 months for a baby elephant to be born and are usually 200 pounds and stand about three feet tall when

born.

III. FAMILY MEMBERS

Some animals that are related to the African Elephant include the Mammuthus (wooly mammoth), the Loxodonta africana (African savannah elephant), Loxodonta cyclotis (African forest elephant), and the Elephas maximus (Asian Elephant)

A group of African Elephants, or just a group of elephants in general, is called a herd.

The babies of African Elephants are called calf.

IV. INTERESTING FACTS
The African Elephant can grow up to 8.2 ft to 13 ft tall and weigh from 2.5 to 7 tons (one ton is 2000 pounds). When a calf elephant is born, the tend to gain 2 to 3 pounds a day till its first birthday.

The average lifespan of an African Elephant is 70 years.

The African Elephant’s walking speed ranges from 0.5 to 2.5 meters per second (1.2-6.2 miles per hour). A charging elephant can achieve 5 meters per second (12.4 miles per hour)

The weight of the African Elephant varies from 2.5 tons to 7 tons, one ton is 2000 pounds.

The main enemy of the African Elephants are poachers who kill the elephants for their ivory tusks. Some predators that prey on the Elephant are lions, hyenas, and crocodiles,

Other interesting facts

When male elephants become 13 to 20 years old, they are mature enough to have their own children.

Just like humans can be right handed or left handed, elephants can be right tusked or left tusked. The dominant tusk can be identified because it will be more worn down than the other tusks.

African Elephants live in a matriarchal society (Female elephants “ruled). In their society, the matriarch, or oldest female elephant, was the one who lead the herd.

V. BEHAVIOR

African Elephants tend to aggregate into large herds to protect the young. They will also gather around dead elephants they had knew before and mourn the loss, which can last weeks. Female calves tend to stay with the mother, as male calves and adults tend to wander off on their own.

What is unique about the behavior of African Elephants is that they tend to stay around dead members of their community. Some say that they are mourning the dead. This behavior usually last for weeks, around three or more weeks. What is also unique about the behavior of African Elephants is that the calves like to charge, chase, or wrestle each other with their trunks