Facinating animal facts – Elephants

If you are big and you eat food equivalent to six to eight percent of your body weight and sleep while standing, then you may call yourself as a little elephy…..
Babies suck their thumbs while baby elephants suck their trunks… The young elephant calves suckle with their mouth and not their trunk.

Did you know that, just as humans are right-handed or left-handed, elephants are either right-tusked or left-tusked? Do you know how to identify this? Usually the dominant tusk is the shorter of the two. They constantly use their dominant tusk and hence it becomes shorter due to wear and tear.
Elephants are so huge that they cannot jump. Scientists say that, the elephant’s bone- structure makes it difficult for it to bend its leg sufficiently enough to jump high.
Elephants cannot reach the ground with their mouths as their necks are too short. The elephant’s trunk is a fusion of its upper lip and nose.

The most fascinating fact is that, their versatile trunk compensates for their short neck and helps them to feed from the ground and high trees. Did you know that they can paint too? Watch this fascinating video.
Yet another amazing fact about elephants is that, they are extremely intelligent and have memories that span many years. An Elephant that you played with when you were a little kid can remember you for four decades or more. Employing this memory, the female head of elephants, also known as the matriarch, guides its herds over tens of miles, to water supplies, that it remembers from the past.

Science discoveries have shown that elephants can communicate over long distances. They do so by producing a sub-sonic rumble that travels over the ground, faster than sound does through air. Other elephants, receive these messages through the sensitive skin on their feet and trunks. They also use these communication methods to find their mates.

Here is an interesting and funny poem on elephants….

These cute creatures with their long Grey trunks

Sadly are not as agile as chipmunks,
On their pillar like legs they have short square nails,
And the Elephy society’s governed by females,
Although they communicate through rumble,
There will be a calamity if they tumble,
These huge herbivores have poor eyesight,
But their instincts about nature have always been right.
For swatting flies, they have big broad ears,
If you play with them, they won’t forget you for years…
Every day they pass out 40 kg of poo
but I am sure you’ll love these elephys too.