Debbie Carrier, Age 11, Of Tulsa, Okla.., for her question:
How Do The Indian And African Elephants Differ?
The jumbo we see in the zoo is usually an elephant of India. The large gentleman is very civilized and seems quite at home with his human friends. His African cousin is somewhat larger. But he is not so smart and rarely makes a happy adjustment with the human family.
There are marked differences in the appearance of the Indian elephant and the elephant of Africa. But there are even greater differences in character and brain power between the two giant cousins. Though somewhat smaller, the elephant of india is more adaptable and more friendly to human beings. What's more, he can be trained to do valuable work; except in rare and perhaps doubtful cases, the elephant of africa absolutely refuses to work for his living.
All elephants look very much alike, and no one would mistake them for any other animals. It might be hard to tell an African elephant from an Asiatic elephant of india unless we knew what to look for. But side by side, the different features are quite plain. The elephant of Africa has a dark almost blackish skin, and his Asiatic cousin wears a coat of light or darker elephant gray.
Both have great bony heads with massive foreheads. But the forehead of the African elephant is more rounded and slopes backward. The Asian elephant has a great bulging forehead, perhaps to remind us that he is one of the brainiest animals in the world.
The most outstanding difference is in the ears of the two cousins. The ear of an african bull elephant may be four feet wide and five feet long. He keeps them waving in constant motion, perhaps to fan himself with circulating air. When he charges forth in an elephant tantrum, the spread of his ears plus his wide forehead may be 10 feet. The ears of the Asiatic elephant are large enough, but much smaller than
His cousin's, and they a often held neatly folded at the, ,ides of his massive head.
The trunk of the African elephant ends in two lobes which look and act like soft fingers. The Asiatic elephant has but one lobe at the end of his trunk. All elephants have toes, though we see only the nails. The African elephant has five toes on each front foot and three on each hind foot. His Indian cousin has five toes on each front foot and four on each hind foot.
The biggest African bull elephant may stand 13 feet high at shoulder 1eyel. There is a smaller African elephant who makes his home in the rain forests of west africa. He resembles his big cousin, except that he has four hind toes and stands only eight feet tall. The elephant of Asia rarely stands more than dint feet tall. He tips the scales at about six tons, while the bigger African elephant is somewhat heavier.