The Largest and Most Powerful of All Living Land Mammals

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The African elephant is the only mammal that fits that description. While it is large and powerful, it is also among the most gentle and it lives in peaceful family units. Basically, the African elephant lives on open grasslands, but is adaptable enough to live in a variety of habitats, as long as there is a good supply of drinking and bathing water. They like to bathe daily and then coat their skin with mud to protect from insects. African elephants are strict vegetarians, eating a wide variety of grasses, foliage, fruit and small branches and twigs. One sad note is that when elephants loses the few teeth they have, and are unable to grind their food, they will die of starvation. This usually happens around the age of seventy. An interesting thing is that elephants even try to bury their dead with leaves and twigs and they also grieve over their loss, by staying by the dead animal’s ‘grave’ for many hours. A full-grown male is about 10 feet tall at the shoulder and can weigh up to 6 tons. The female, who is smaller, stays pregnant for 22 months and usually gives birth to just one calf. They live in sub-Saharan Africa and need to eat up to 500 pounds of vegetation every day. They also drink up to 40 gallons of water at a time. The largest tusk ever seen was 10 feet long and weighed more than 229 pounds. An elephant can also outrun a man and a herd on the move can cover 50 miles in a day. Have you ever been up close to an elephant? Picture by Pixabay