Asian Elephant • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• • • • • • • • Elephas Maximus
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Teacher Guide: Meet the Proboscideans
Teacher Guide: Meet the Proboscideans Concepts: • Living and extinct animals can be classified by their physical traits into families and species. • We can often infer what animals eat by the size and shape of their teeth. Learning objectives: • Students will learn about the relationship between extinct and extant proboscideans. • Students will closely examine the teeth of a mammoth, mastodon, and gomphothere and relate their observations to the animals’ diets. They will also contrast a human’s jaw and teeth to a mammoth’s. This is an excellent example of the principle of “form fits function” that occurs throughout biology. TEKS: Grade 5 § 112.16(b)7D, 9A, 10A Location: Hall of Geology & Paleontology (1st Floor) Time: 10 minutes for “Mammoth & Mastodon Teeth,” 5 minutes for “Comparing Human & Mammoth Teeth” Supplies: • Worksheet • Pencil • Clipboard Vocabulary: mammoth, mastodon, grazer, browser, tooth cusps, extant/extinct Pre-Visit: • Introduce students to the mammal group Proboscidea, using the Meet the Proboscideans worksheets. • Review geologic time, concentrating on the Pleistocene (“Ice Age”) when mammoths, mastodons, and gomphotheres lived in Texas. • Read a short background book on mammoths and mastodons with your students: – Mammoths and Mastodons: Titans of the Ice Age by Cheryl Bardoe, published in 2010 by Abrams Books for Young Readers, New York, NY. Post-Visit Classroom Activities: • Assign students a short research project on living proboscideans (African and Asian elephants) and their conservation statuses (use http://www.iucnredlist.org/). Discuss the possibilities of their extinction, and relate to the extinction events of mammoths and mastodons. Meet the Proboscideans Mammoths, Mastodons, and Gomphotheres are all members of Proboscidea (pro-bo-SID-ia), a group which gets its name from the word proboscis (the Latin word for nose), referring to their large trunks. -
The Childs Elephant Free Download
THE CHILDS ELEPHANT FREE DOWNLOAD Rachel Campbell-Johnston | 400 pages | 03 Apr 2014 | Random House Children's Publishers UK | 9780552571142 | English | London, United Kingdom Rachel Campbell-Johnston Penguin 85th by Coralie Bickford-Smith. Stocking Fillers. The Childs Elephant the other The Childs Elephant of the scale, when elephants eat in one location and defecate in another, they function as crucial dispersers of seeds; many plants, trees, The Childs Elephant bushes would have a hard time surviving if their seeds didn't feature on elephant menus. Share Flipboard Email. I cannot trumpet this book loudly enough. African elephants are much bigger, fully grown males approaching six or seven tons making them the earth's largest terrestrial mammalscompared to only four or five tons for Asian elephants. As big as they are, elephants have an outsize influence on their habitats, uprooting trees, trampling ground underfoot, and even deliberately enlarging water holes so they can take relaxing baths. Events Podcasts Penguin Newsletter Video. If only we could all be Jane Goodall or Dian Fossey, and move to the jungle or plains and thoroughly dedicate our lives to wildlife. For example, an elephant can use its trunk to shell a peanut without damaging the kernel nestled inside or to wipe debris from its eyes or other parts of its body. Elephants are polyandrous and The Childs Elephant mating happens year-round, whenever females are in estrus. Habitat and Range. Analytics cookies help us to improve our website by collecting and reporting information on how you use it. Biology Expert. Elephants are beloved creatures, but they aren't always fully understood by humans. -
Elephant Escapades Audience Activity Designed for 10 Years Old and Up
Elephant Escapades Audience Activity designed for 10 years old and up Goal Students will learn the differences between the African and Asian elephants, as well as, how their different adaptations help them survive in their habitats. Objective • To understand elephant adaptations • To identify the differences between African and Asian elephants Conservation Message Elephants play a major role in their habitats. They act as keystone species which means that other species depend on them and if elephants were removed from the ecosystem it would change drastically. It is important to understand these species and take efforts to encourage the preservation of African and Asian elephants and their habitats. Background Information Elephants are the largest living land animal; they can weigh between 6,000 and 12,000 pounds and stand up to 12 feet tall. There are only two species of elephants; the African Elephants and the Asian Elephant. The Asian elephant is native to parts of South and Southeast Asia. While the African elephant is native to the continent of Africa. While these two species are very different, they do share some common traits. For example, both elephant species have a trunk that can move in any direction and move heavy objects. An elephant’s trunk is a fusion, or combination, of the nose and upper lip and does not contain any bones. Their trunks have thousands of muscles and tendons that make movements precise and give the trunk amazing strength. Elephants use their trunks for snorkeling, smelling, eating, defending themselves, dusting and other activities that they perform daily. Another common feature that the two elephant species share are their feet. -
Newsletter March 2021
Dzanga Sangha Protected Areas © David Santiago Newsletter March 2021 Wildlife During the month of March, the UICN publicly announced two decisions concerning forest elephants. The first one was declaring the forest elephant (Loxodonta Cyclotis) an altogether different species, as until recently it was merely considered a subspecies. The second decision was declaring this species critically endangered. Dzanga Sangha remains for the moment one of the few places in all of Africa where the number of individuals has remained relatively stable in recent years, and it is also the place where they are most easily observed. The links attached below talk more about this subject. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/25/shades-of-grey-how-to-tell-african-elephant-species-apart- aoe https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/25/africas-forest-elephant-has-been-largely-overlooked-now- we-need-to-fight-for-it-aoe https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/both-african-elephant-species-are-now-endangered-one-critically https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/environment/2466472/african-elephant-status-change-a-wake-up-call-for- humans/ https://theconversation.com/new-decisions-by-global-conservation-group-bolster-efforts-to-save-africas-elephants- 158157 In the other hand, Terence Fuh, Head of Primate Habituation, Research and Monitoring for the DSPA has been listed among the top 100 Young African Conservation Leaders, out of the 565 nominations received from 425 youth organizations and networks which underwent a rigorous judging and verification process. https://top100youth.africa/ Over the last three years we have had a total of 4 gorillas babies born into the three habituated groups in DSPA. -
Distinguishing Extant Elephants Ivory from Mammoth Ivory Using a Short
www.nature.com/scientificreports OPEN Distinguishing extant elephants ivory from mammoth ivory using a short sequence of cytochrome b gene Jacob Njaramba Ngatia1, Tian Ming Lan2,3,4, Yue Ma1,5, Thi Dao Dinh1, Zhen Wang1,5, Thomas D. Dahmer6 & Yan Chun Xu1,5,7* Trade in ivory from extant elephant species namely Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), African savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana) and African forest elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis) is regulated internationally, while the trade in ivory from extinct species of Elephantidae, including woolly mammoth, is unregulated. This distinction creates opportunity for laundering and trading elephant ivory as mammoth ivory. The existing morphological and molecular genetics methods do not reliably distinguish the source of ivory items that lack clear identifcation characteristics or for which the quality of extracted DNA cannot support amplifcation of large gene fragments. We present a PCR-sequencing method based on 116 bp target sequence of the cytochrome b gene to specifcally amplify elephantid DNA while simultaneously excluding non-elephantid species and ivory substitutes, and while avoiding contamination by human DNA. The partial Cytochrome b gene sequence enabled accurate association of ivory samples with their species of origin for all three extant elephants and from mammoth. The detection limit of the PCR system was as low as 10 copy numbers of target DNA. The amplifcation and sequencing success reached 96.7% for woolly mammoth ivory and 100% for African savanna elephant and African forest elephant ivory. This is the frst validated method for distinguishing elephant from mammoth ivory and it provides forensic support for investigation of ivory laundering cases. -
African Elephant
Species fact sheet: African Elephant A powerful symbol of nature, the world’s largest land animal is still under threat African elephant, Kenya. © WWF-Canon / Martin Harvey African elephants are the largest living land animals. Once 2. The forest elephant (L. a. cyclotis) is smaller and darker numbering millions across the African continent, their than the savannah elephant, has straighter, populations had been decimated by the mid-1980s by downward-pointing tusks, and lives in central and western systematic poaching. The status of the species now varies Africa’s equatorial forests. Forest elephants are more greatly across Africa. Some populations remain generally threatened than the savannah sub-species due endangered due to poaching for meat and ivory, habitat to poaching and loss of forest habitat. loss, and conflict with humans, while others are secure and Elephant numbers vary greatly over the 37 range states; expanding. some populations remain endangered, while others are There are two sub-species of African now secure. For example, most countries in West Africa elephant: count their elephants in tens or hundreds, with animals scattered in small blocks of isolated forest; probably only 1. The savannah elephant (L. a. africana), also known as the bush elephant, is the largest elephant in the world, with three countries in this region have more than 1,000 a maximum shoulder height of 4m and weighing up to animals. In contrast, elephant populations in southern 7,500kg. It is recognizable by its large outward-curving Africa are large and expanding, with some 300,000 tusks, and it lives throughout the grassy plains and elephants now roaming across the sub-region. -
Elephant TAG/SSP Key Messages
Elephant TAG/SSP Key Messages The most important thing that we can do to positively influence visitors about elephants and elephant conservation is to be clear about the messages, communicate them positively and succinctly and to use staff to reinforce them personally. San Diego Wild Animal Park Introduction: The Elephant TAG/SSP Steering Committee has drafted these Elephant Key Messages for AZA institutions to incorporate into their on-site elephant graphics and/or presentations. We also hope that they will be a useful resource as you craft future programs or refine current ones. Our goal was to create elephant natural history, conservation, management and welfare messages that would be meaningful, relevant and inspiring to all. With so much confusion around the general public’s view of elephant management, this document includes important, consistent information to share with visitors about the high quality of elephant care and welfare in responsible AZA institutions. These messages are not meant to be delivered all at once, but rather to select one or a few messages that suit a program’s objectives. NATURAL HISTORY MESSAGE 1 Elephants have special features that are unique in the animal world. • Elephants are the largest land animals in the world. • Their unique trunk acts as part nose, part hand to assist in breathing, detecting odors, manipulating objects, social interactions, eating, dust bathing, drawing-up water and releasing water into the mouth. • Elephants have the longest gestation of any land animal of 21.5 months. • Elephants have the largest brain of any land animals. • Elephants are long lived. Studies have shown that life expectancy at birth in African elephants is 41 years for females and 24 years for males. -
The Distribution of Proboscidea (Elephants) Professor Dr
The Distribution of Proboscidea (Elephants) Professor Dr. Erich Thenius [In: Kosmos #5, May, pp. 235-242, 1964, Stuttgart] When I speak here about animals with a trunk, I do not mean the tapirs or pigs, but I refer only to the elephants and their ancestors, like the Mastodons and Dinotheria which we call the Proboscidea (after the Greek: proboscis = trunk). Their main characteristic is their remarkable trunk which has been fashioned to become a “gripping” organ. That organ was not present in the geologically oldest ancestors whose skeletons stem from the deposits of the Eocene (old Tertiary) in Africa. Even though we have no “soft tissues” of those animals, their skeletal features suffice to tell the scientist just what their bodily characteristics would have been. Thus also, we are not really going to discuss much about their distribution in historic times, but rather, we will concentrate on the development of these characteristic mammals, from their inception to their distribution in the past. A history of the Proboscidea is necessarily a history of their distribution in time and space. Information of these animals is available from numerous fossil findings in nearly all continents. But, before we even consider the fossil history, let us take a quick look of the current distribution of elephants which is shown in Figure 1. Nowadays, there are only two species of elephants: the Indian and African elephants. They not only differ geographically but also morphologically. That is to say, they are different in their bodily form and in their anatomy in several characteristics as every attentive zoo visitor who sees them side-by-side easily observes: The small-eared Indian elephant (Elephas maximus) has a markedly bowed upper skull; the African cousin (Loxodonta africana) has longer legs and markedly larger ears. -
Captive Elephant Population of North America: 1986 Sandra Lash Shoshani
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Digital Commons@Wayne State University Elephant Volume 2 | Issue 2 Article 15 9-6-1986 Captive Elephant Population of North America: 1986 Sandra Lash Shoshani Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/elephant Recommended Citation Shoshani, S. L. (1986). Captive Elephant Population of North America: 1986. Elephant, 2(2), 123-130. Doi: 10.22237/elephant/ 1521732027 This Brief Notes / Report is brought to you for free and open access by the Open Access Journals at DigitalCommons@WayneState. It has been accepted for inclusion in Elephant by an authorized editor of DigitalCommons@WayneState. Fall 1986 LASH SHOSHANI - CAPTIVE ELEPHANTS 123 CAPTIVE ELEPHANT POPULATION OF NORTH AMERICA: 1986 compiled by Sandra Lash Shoshani 106 E. Hickory Grove Road Bloomfield Hills, Michigan 48013 USA Table I. Summary of captive elephants in 76 North American zoos and 5 private institutions, as reported by the International Species Inventory System (ISIS), for the year ending December 31, 1985, courtesy of Nathan Flesness. U. S. Zoos Canadian Zoos Total African 129 15 144 elephant (20M, 109F)1 (3M, 12F) (23M, 121F) Asian 128 5 133 elephant (13M, 115F) (2M, 3F) (15M, 118F) Totals 257 20 2772 1 F=female M=male 2 Of these 277, 6 Asian and 8 African were reported captive-born, since 1979. In addition to the data from ISIS, Toby E. Styles has sent us an estimate of the number of elephants in Canada, as of June 1986. Among those not represented in the ISIS census are four more reports, with the following numbers: African elephant 1 (0M, 1F) Asian elephant 5 (1M, 4F) Recent figures for the number of elephants held in circuses have been compiled in part by several groups of people and individuals. -
Asian Elephants (Elephas Maximus) Reassure Others in Distress
Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) reassure others in distress Joshua M. Plotnik and Frans B.M. de Waal Living Links, Yerkes National Primate Research Center and Department of Psychology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA ABSTRACT Contact directed by uninvolved bystanders toward others in distress, often termed consolation, is uncommon in the animal kingdom, thus far only demonstrated in the great apes, canines, and corvids. Whereas the typical agonistic context of such contact is relatively rare within natural elephant families, other causes of distress may trigger similar, other-regarding responses. In a study carried out at an elephant camp in Thailand, we found that elephants affiliated significantly more with other individuals through directed, physical contact and vocal communication following a distress event than in control periods. In addition, bystanders affiliated with each other, and matched the behavior and emotional state of the first distressed individ- ual, suggesting emotional contagion. The initial distress responses were overwhelm- ingly directed toward ambiguous stimuli, thus making it difficult to determine if bystanders reacted to the distressed individual or showed a delayed response to the same stimulus. Nonetheless, the directionality of the contacts and their nature strongly suggest attention toward the emotional states of conspecifics. The elephants’ behavior is therefore best classified with similar consolation responses by apes, pos- sibly based on convergent evolution of empathic capacities. Subjects Animal Behavior, Ecology Keywords Consolation, Elephants, Conflict resolution, Targeted helping, Convergent cognitive evolution Submitted 30 December 2013 INTRODUCTION Accepted 29 January 2014 Published 18 February 2014 Most empirical evidence for how animals react to others in distress comes from the study Corresponding author of conflict resolution (de Waal & van Roosmalen, 1979; de Waal & Aureli, 1996; de Waal, Joshua M. -
Elephants Are Large Mammals of the Family Elephantidae and the Order Proboscidea
Elephants are large mammals of the family Elephantidae and the order Proboscidea. Traditionally, two species are recognised, the African elephant (Loxodonta africana) and the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), although some evidence suggests that African bush elephants and African forest elephants are separate species (L. africana and L. cyclotis respectively). Elephants are scattered throughout sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Elephantidae are the only surviving family of the order Proboscidea; other, now extinct, families of the order include mammoths and mastodons. Male African elephants are the largest surviving terrestrial animals and can reach a height of 4 m (13 ft) and weigh 7,000 kg (15,000 lb). All elephants have several distinctive features the most notable of which is a long trunk or proboscis, used for many purposes, particularly breathing, lifting water and grasping objects. Their incisors grow into tusks, which can serve as weapons and as tools for moving objects and digging. Elephants' large ear flaps help to control their body temperature. Their pillar-like legs can carry their great weight. African elephants have larger ears and concave backs while Asian elephants have smaller ears and convex or level backs. Elephants are herbivorous and can be found in different habitats including savannahs, forests, deserts and marshes. They prefer to stay near water. They are considered to be keystone species due to their impact on their environments. Other animals tend to keep their distance, predators such as lions, tigers, hyenas and wild dogs usually target only the young elephants (or "calves"). Females ("cows") tend to live in family groups, which can consist of one female with her calves or several related females with offspring. -
AC27 Doc. 12.5
Original language: English AC27 Doc. 12.5 CONVENTION ON INTERNATIONAL TRADE IN ENDANGERED SPECIES OF WILD FAUNA AND FLORA ____________ Twenty-seventh meeting of the Animals Committee Veracruz (Mexico), 28 April – 3 May 2014 Interpretation and implementation of the Convention Review of Significant Trade in specimens of Appendix-II species [Resolution Conf. 12.8 (Rev. CoP13)] SELECTION OF SPECIES FOR TRADE REVIEWS FOLLOWING COP16 1. This document has been prepared by the Secretariat. 2. In Resolution Conf. 12.8 (Rev. CoP13) on Review of Significant Trade in specimens of Appendix-II species, the Conference of the Parties: DIRECTS the Animals and Plants Committees, in cooperation with the Secretariat and experts, and in consultation with range States, to review the biological, trade and other relevant information on Appendix-II species subject to significant levels of trade, to identify problems and solutions concerning the implementation of Article IV, paragraphs 2 (a), 3 and 6 (a)... 3. In accordance with paragraph a) of that Resolution under the section Regarding conduct of the Review of Significant Trade, the Secretariat requested UNEP-WCMC to produce a summary from the CITES Trade Database of annual report statistics showing the recorded net level of exports for Appendix-II species over the five most recent years. Its report is attached as Annex 1 (English only) to the present document. The raw data used to prepare this summary are available in document AC27 Inf. 2. 4. Paragraph b) of the same section directs the Animals Committee, on the basis of recorded trade levels and information available to it, the Secretariat, Parties or other relevant experts, to select species of priority concern for review (whether or not such species have been the subject of a previous review).