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February 28, 2006

Did You Know? Elephant Bites

Did you know that elephants have six teeth, some of which are continually replaced, much like sharks?

The Better To Poke You With...
Elephant tusks are actually just specialized upper incisors. These are used primarily for digging and defense.

Elephants use their tusks to dig for water, salt, or yummy roots to eat. They also use them to strip bark from trees. They do this to uncover the tasting tree pulp beneath. This has become such a problem in some trees, like the ancient baobab trees, have been surrounded with boulders to keep the elephants away.

In terms of defense, elephants may use their tusks to fight elephants, as well as to fend off other predators. You'll also see elephants sawing away at trees with their tusks, marking their territory.

African Elephants, both males and females, have big, ivory tusks. Some curve over ten feet long, and grow very fast - up to half a foot per year! The bump-headed Asian male elephants have tusks, but the females don't really have them.

Elephants favor one tusk over the other, just as people are generally right or left-handed. The dominant tusk, also refered to as a master tusk, is often more worn down.

The Better To Chew With...
Elephants are herbivores. They eat a lot of leaves, shoots, and roots, and so they need really good chewing teeth. During their lives, they have a set of four teeth - two bicuspids and two molars. Instead of having a set of baby teeth followed by adult teeth, like most other mammals (humans included), elephants have a a finite tooth replacement cycle, much like some sharks. Six times over the course of their lifetime, the elephant will lose its teeth and get them replaced with new ones, for a total of 24 teeth.

An old elephant will lose its last pair and be restricted to soft foods, much like an elderly person might be. This is why you'll often see very old elephants lurking in marshes where food is more to their tastes, so to speak.

Some of this info came from: DK Pocket Nature Facts & Wikipedia

For More On Elephants, check out African Field Notes: The African Elephant!

Posted by sorsha at February 28, 2006 9:13 PM