Asian Elephant

About the asian elephant

The Asian elephant is the only living species in the genus Elephas and the largest living land animal in Asia, second in size worldwide only to the African bush elephant. Carl Linnaeus named it Elephas maximus in 1758, basing his description partly on the skeleton of a female Asian elephant named Hansken that had toured Europe in the 17th century. Three subspecies are recognized: the Sri Lankan elephant (E. m. maximus), the Indian elephant (E. m. indicus), and the Sumatran elephant (E. m. sumatranus). Sri Lankan elephants are the largest and darkest-skinned of the three, with the most distinct patches of depigmentation on the ears, face, trunk, and belly; a possible fourth subspecies, the Borneo elephant, is smaller than the others but has larger ears, a longer tail, and straighter tusks, and its ancestors appear to have separated from the mainland population around 300,000 years ago.

Physically, the Asian elephant is characterized by a long trunk ending in a single finger-like process (African elephants have two), large tusks in males, laterally folded ears, and wrinkled grey skin that is often partly depigmented on the trunk, ears, or neck. Because its trunk has only one "finger," the species relies more on wrapping around food and squeezing it into the mouth rather than the pincer-like grip African elephants use. Asian elephants are also noted to have more muscle coordination and can perform more complex manipulative tasks. Cows usually lack visible tusks; when present in females they are called "tushes" and are barely visible. Some bulls also lack tusks and are known as "makhnas," especially common among Sri Lankan elephants.

Skin averages 18 mm (0.71 in) thick over most of the body and 30 mm (1.2 in) thick on the back, and its wrinkles and folds increase surface area for shedding heat — the species tolerates cold better than excessive heat. Fully grown bulls stand about 2.75 m (9 ft) at the shoulder and weigh about 4.0 t (4.4 short tons) on average; cows stand about 2.40 m (7 ft 10 in) and weigh about 2.7 t (3.0 short tons). Body and head length including the trunk runs 5.5–6.5 m (18–21 ft), with a tail 1.2–1.5 m (3 ft 11 in–4 ft 11 in) long. The largest bull ever recorded, shot in Assam in 1924, stood an estimated 3.43 m (11.3 ft) at the shoulder and weighed about 7 t (7.7 short tons).

Behavior and diet

Asian elephants are crepuscular, most active at dawn and dusk, and classed as megaherbivores that eat up to 150 kg (330 lb) of vegetation a day — 50 to 75% of their day is spent eating. They are generalist grazers and browsers known to feed on at least 112 plant species, most often from the order Malvales as well as legumes, palms, sedges, and true grasses; they browse more heavily in the dry season, when bark makes up a large share of the diet. They drink at least once daily, need 80–200 liters of water a day, use even more for bathing, and are rarely far from a permanent water source.

Cows and calves travel in groups, typically three related adult females and their offspring, though groups of up to 15 adult females and seasonal aggregations of 17 individuals have been recorded in Sri Lanka. Bulls disperse from their mothers at adolescence and live solitary lives or in temporary "bachelor groups." Social ties among Asian elephants tend to be looser and more fluid than those of African bush elephants, and the species is now understood to lack the rigid matriarch-led hierarchy once assumed. Asian elephants communicate with growls, squeaks, and snorts — low-frequency growls used at short range escalate to roars for long-distance communication, chirping squeaks signal conflict or nervousness, and trumpets signal extreme arousal.

Adult elephants are largely safe from natural predators, though tigers have occasionally been recorded killing calves separated from the herd, and in isolated cases in 2011 and 2014, tigers were documented killing adult elephants in India. Elephants react less fearfully to the growls of smaller predators like leopards than to those of tigers.

Range and habitat

Asian elephants are distributed across the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, from India in the west to Borneo in the east, and from Nepal in the north to Sumatra in the south. They inhabit grasslands, tropical evergreen and semi-evergreen forests, moist and dry deciduous forests, dry thorn forests, and also cultivated land, secondary forest, and scrubland, occurring from sea level up to over 3,000 m (9,800 ft) — in the eastern Himalaya they regularly move above that elevation in summer.

Isolated populations persist in Bangladesh's Chittagong Hills, and in China the species survives only in three prefectures of southern Yunnan, with an estimated 300 individuals as of 2020. India holds the largest share of the wild population: an estimated 27,312 individuals in 2017, rising to 27,000–29,000 by 2019. As of 2019, the global wild population was estimated at 48,323 to 51,680 individuals.

Conservation status

The Asian elephant has been listed as Endangered (EN) on the IUCN Red List since 1986, reflecting a population decline of at least 50% over the last three elephant generations, roughly 60–75 years. The primary threats named are loss of habitat, habitat degradation and fragmentation, and poaching. Captive populations face a separate problem: while some captive females in semi-natural surroundings have lived beyond 60 years, captive Asian elephants generally die younger than wild ones, and captive populations are declining because of a combination of low birth rates and high death rates.