How tall is a fully grown male elephant

This ensures that the mother has plenty to eat while she is suckling her calf. Females between 14 - 45 years may give birth to calves approximately every four years with the mean interbirth intervals increasing to five years by age 52 and six years by age Interbirth intervals of up to 13 years may occur depending upon habitat conditions and population densities.

The mean calving interval varies from population to population, with high density populations or otherwise nutritionally stressed populations exhibiting longer intervals between births.

After 22 months growing inside its mother's womb, a newborn baby elephant weighs more than the average adult human being. Female calves weigh kg - lb. Males are heavier and weigh up to kg lb.

An adult bull savanna elephant can have a shoulder height of 3. Females are smaller, weighing up to 3, Kg 7, lb. Elephants are unusual among mammals in that they continue to grow throughout their life, although their rate of growth slows after they reach sexual maturity. Elephant home ranges vary from population to population and habitat to habitat. Individual home ranges vary from 15 to 3, square kilometers , square miles. Elephants are not territorial although they utilize specific home areas during particular times of the year.

Elephants communicate with each other in many ways and with all their senses. They rely less on their eyes than humans do but visual signals are important and the position of their ears and trunks show what mood they are in.

Their sense of smell can tell them something about another elephant's health or sexual condition. Touch can also be used to convey some information. However, the main way an elephant communicates deliberately is by sound. Elephant vocalizations range from high-pitched squeaks to deep rumbles, two-thirds of which are emitted at a frequency too low for the human ear to detect. Such low frequency calls may be heard by other elephants at distances of at least eight kilometers. Recent studies also show that foot stomping and low rumbling emitted by elephants generate seismic waves in the ground that can travel nearly 20 miles along the surface of the Earth.

Elephants may be able to sense these vibrations through their feet and interpret them as warning signals of a distant danger. They may therefore be communicating at much farther distances than previously thought. Elephants do have remarkable memories. In the wild, elephants appear to remember for years the relationships with dozens, perhaps hundreds of other elephants, some of whom they may see only occasionally.

They also have an impressive memory for places to drink and to find food. This information gets passed on from generation to generation. Elephants live in a social hierarchy dominated by older females. Females travel in long-lasting social units of about half a dozen adult females and their offspring, with the unit being led by a single older female, the matriarch.

But typically, only male Asian elephants will grow large tusks, while the females and a few males have much smaller tusks called tushes that don't always grow outside the mouth. Tusks are large, deeply rooted teeth that evolved to assist the elephant in digging, lifting, gathering food, and defense while also protecting the trunk, according to World Wildlife Fund.

In the same way that humans tend to be right-handed or left-handed, elephants can be right-tusked or left-tusked. Their dominant tusk is easy to identify, because it will be more worn down than the less dominant tusk, according to the World Wildlife Fund. Both species eat all types of vegetation, including a variety of grasses, fruits, leaves, bark and roots.

They spend about about 16 hours eating, consuming anywhere from to lbs. Groups of elephants, or herds, follow a matriarchal structure with the eldest female in charge. Herds are composed of primarily female family members and young calves, according to the San Diego Zoo, and include 6 to 20 members depending on the food supply. When the family gets too large, herds often split into smaller groups that stay within the same area.

The matriarch relies on her experience and memory to recall where the best spots for food, water are, and where to find protection from the elements. The matriarch is also responsible for teaching the younger members of her family how to socialize with other elephants. Elephants are very social and can communicate with one another and identify other elephants from distances of up to 2 miles using rumbling, low-pitched sounds that fall below the audible range of humans, according to the National Zoo.

The natural color is grayish black, but an elephant usually appears to be the same color as the soil where the elephant lives. One way a person regulates body temperature is by sweating — on a person, sweat glands are located throughout their skin. Elephants have very few sweat glands. The few sweat glands that an elephant has are located on the foot, near the cuticles. This results in a skin that is dry to the touch but soft and supple.

If you look at an elephant on a hot day, you may see a wet area around the top of their toenails. The only visible glands that are found on the skin of an elephant are the mammary glands and the temporal glands. Elephants have one temporal gland on each side of the head between the eye and the ear.

The temporal gland is a large gland, much like a sweat gland, that sometimes produces a secretion that trickles down the side of the face. In female elephants, these glands may become active when the animal gets very excited. In addition to their tusks, which are modified incisors, an elephant will have four molars, with a molar located in each jaw.

An African elephant will go through six sets of molars in a lifetime. Later in life, a single molar can be inches long and weigh more than eight lb. The surface of the molar differs between Asian and African elephants. There is no real tooth socket. As a molar is formed and utilized by the elephant, it passes through the jaw from back to front in a conveyor belt fashion. The final set typically erupts when the animal is in its early forties and must last for the rest of its life.

After these last sets of molars wear smooth, an elephant will have difficulty chewing and processing food, which in turn begins to contribute to a decline in the animals overall well-being. Research shows that as many as 70 different calls have already been identified, ranging from the loud trumpets of panic to the comforting rumbles of reassurance.

They also use infrasound sounds that are at a frequency inaudible to humans calls which can be heard up to 14km away. Recent evidence also suggests that they may also be able to communicate through seismic waves that pass through the ground, which they pick up through their sensitive feet. Like many other animals, elephants also use smells to pick up information about other elephants and their environment.

For example, a male can tell when a female is ready to mate from the chemical signs she leaves in her urine and faeces. This, combined with the characteristic calls of that time, ensures that all the local males will know when the time is right to compete for her affections. Elephants secrete chemicals from temporal glands that are behind their eyes. We do not fully understand their function but it does appear to be linked to chemical communication.

Elephant Reproduction Reproduction is one of the most important elements of nature. It ensures the continuation of every species, and every species does it differently! In the elephant world, females are generally ready to become a mum at around years old and can give birth to as many as 12 calves throughout the course of their lives.

Whilst we consider the human gestation period to be lengthy, at a mere 9 months, be thankful you are not an elephant! The average gestation period for a female elephant is a whopping 22 months. Female elephants must have a thing for the older man, as males do not come into their prime until they are between years of age. Musth is a periodic condition in bull elephants that is characterised by highly aggressive behaviour and is accompanied by a large rise in reproductive hormones.

Testosterone levels in an elephant in musth can be as much as 60 times greater than in the same elephant at other times. Musth can last for as long as six months in the dominant males and they will often stop feeding for several days during this period of time.

Elephant Love and Relationships Rumour has it that elephants mate for life. Whilst this is not necessarily true, animal scientist have proven that they will never stray far from mating partners. They are known to be able to develop strong and intimate bonds between friends and family members. They can form lifelong friendships and will often only move in the same groups for their entire life.

Elephants are also known to mourn the death of a loved one, and have even been seen grieving over stillborn calves, or baby elephants who do not survive the first few months of life.

Family groups have even been known to return to the locations where friends or family members died and linger there for some time. Elephants need excellent memory skills in order to survive in the wild, and can recognise a previous companion or family member by the scent of their urine alone.

So, whilst elephants may not quite be as romantic as we like to think they are, there is certainly a lot of evidence that they do form strong bonds with their own social networks.

Elephants can live for up to 70 years in the wild, so being part of a group is important to them. Baby Elephant Facts Baby elephants are cute - there are no two ways about that. But, they are also highly evolved and one of the most advanced species when it comes to their new born capabilities. A baby elephant is called a calf and can weigh around lbs 91 kg and stand about 3 feet 1 m tall. They can't see very well when they are born, but much like human babies, they can recognise their mothers by touch, scent, and sound.

For the first few months, the babies stay very close to their mothers for food, warmth and support. They are hungry little things too, and can consume as much as 3 gallons of their mothers milk every day.

Weaning is not a speedy process for elephants either, as babies can continue to drink their mothers milk until they are as much as 10 years old. Luckily, the female elephant community is social and supportive, with young calves being tended to not only by their mothers, but also by other females in the herd.

When a new baby is born, all of the females in the group trumpet the news and announce the new arrival. Within minutes of being born, the calf must stand on its own four feet, literally.

Calves need to be upright in order to reach their mothers milk, otherwise they will perish. For the first year of their lives, their trunks are not something they are able to control very well. Much like human babies, elephants learn their behaviour from parents and older family member, including how to put their trunks to good use. Much more so than other animals, elephant babies exclusively learn how to adapt to their new surroundings by following the behaviour of their mothers over a long period of time.

This means that they stay close to their parents and family members for much of their childhood. Their Asian contemporaries can be found in Nepal, India and Southeast Asia in scrub forests and rain forests.