Elephant Evolution

Explanation and Analysis: There really are a lot of characteristics overlooked when talking about Elephants as a whole species.

The Fossas ancestor, the original ancestor of the Eupleridae family, is unknown. But through its ancestors, the Fossa is related to Mongooses.

The official title of the world’s largest land dwelling animal belongs to the elephant, more specifically, the African elephant. Elephants also are some of the most deadly animals, which therefore increase the danger of human and elephant interactions. The more human interactions occur, the more deaths result, whether it is the elephant or the human who dies. These animals, surprisingly, are socially apt; their trunk is used for more than just eating and drinking- it is used for socializing. They are complex animals who live in large familial herds-females stay with their family throughout their entire lives while males only stay for approximately fifteen years (Elephant Protection, 1). Elephants possess a great memory and only forget what they learn occasionally and rarely, giving way to the “an elephant never forgets” saying (Maloiy, 178c). Despite how many people use the beloved saying, elephants may not be around much longer due to the shortened life span and increased mortality rates. Due to their incisor teeth, tusks, being extremely expensive and profitable, they are being murdered for the wealth they carry. This, coupled with the life span shortening because of malicious treatments and brutal practices reduces the life span of the African elephant from 56 to 16 years and the Asian elephant from 42 to 19 years (Elephant Protection, 1). According to what the statistics show, elephants may be following their ancestors to their death. Of the group of mammals called

Megafauna are not direct ancestors of the current animals, rather certain animals both evolved from a common ancestor. An example of this can be seen in

In modern ages, we witnessed these docile animals and their fate of quick extinction due to human activity in islands of Oceania, so it is reasonable to assume that the same thing happened to others about 40,000 years ago when they first met human beings.

Article 1: Late Middle Eocene primate from Myanmar and the initial anthropoid colonization of Africa

The first true evolution of primates goes all the way back to 55 million years ago.. Primates descend in two orders, Stepsirrhini and Haplorrhini. The Stepsirhines were the first of the suborders to unfold. That term is identical with prosimians. Prosimians are defined as a “pre-monkey” in Latin(anthro.palomar.edu). Evidence was not shown until the 20th century of prosimians evolving before the monkey. A stepsirhine that is still alive and studied today are lemurs. Lemurs are the oldest ancestors of monkeys, apes, and humans. There is research of a Lemur’s past and present habitats, discovered theorists, predators, diet, life expectancy, large number of subspecies, and fossils collected about Lemurs.

The Diprotodon co-existed with humans for thousands of years before becoming extinct some 25,000 years ago. It was also the last megafauna to become extinct.

Unfortunately, keeping these elephants captive has caused issues. The females are at least 35 years of age which isn’t very essential for reproduction so as a result the mortality rate amongst the calves and disease within the

The DNA is very similar between the Mammoth and Mastodon. Which is why the evidence shows that they came from a common ancestor. The evidence shows that the Mammoth and Mastodon were around the same time and they were very similar to each other. They share me features and characteristics. I looked at some evidence that showed they were around the same time because there were fossil records found around the same time period and in the same sediment layers. I also found some evidence explaining that the Mammoth and Mastodon are very similar to today's elephants. This proves that the elephants could have came from the same ancestor or they could be apart of the Mammoth and Mastodon family. After looking at all this evidence I believe that the environment changed which made some of the leave and they adapted to mammoths and the others left to become mastodons and the ones that stayed are today's elephants.

The Sumatran Elephant is a highly endangered animal. This animal has been forced closer and closer to human territory because of their failing ecosystem. This causes them to more likely raid crops and come in contact with humans. They then hunt

The African Bush elephants are found in eastern and southern Africa. Some of the areas with the highest densities of the Bush elephant is: Tanzania, South African, Kenya, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia. The African Bush elephant is terrestrial. The Bush elephant usually live in the grasslands, semi-deserts and the bush lands. They also clear out forest and turn them into more of grassland, by knocking down the trees. The climate that the Bush elephant normally lives in is dry and hot. Their thin hairs and ears help them stay cool. Another way that they stay cool is that their hides become more permeable in the heat. Scientists has performed research on 13 elephants (African and Asian), they measure the release of heat and moisture. What they have found was that their skin opens up at air temperatures as low at 10°C to 12°C, this is what allows them to perspire. Elephants are different than most mammals, that sweats through glands connected to pores, elephants only have pores between their toes. Elephants do not sweat (Phillips, 1992). By all of the skin being permeable they lose more

The poaching of elephants for their tusks has driven the animal in some countries - such as Sierra Leone and Senegal - to the point of extinction. More than 30,000 elephants were slaughtered in Africa last year alone, 382 of them in Kenya. (Stewart, 2013n n.p.).

Both of these beasts belong to the same kingdom (Animalia), phylum (Chordata), sub-phylum (Vertebrata) and class (Mammalia). Meaning they are both back-boned mammalian, animals. They both have hair and give birth to live young. White rhinos (Ceratotherium simum), and Asian elephants (Elephas

Just imagine life without any elephants, wiped out just like the dinosaurs. In the early 1980’s, there were more than a million reported elephants in Africa. Tragically, during that decade, 600,000 elephants were destroyed for ivory products. Today, conceivably no more than 400,000 elephants remain across the continent. Elephants are facing a very real threat of extinction; In fact, the African elephants are listed on the