HELPING AFRICAN ELEPHANTS
It’s #WorldElephantDay each year on August 12th, and it’s a great reason to remind ourselves not only of the grace, intelligence and beauty of elephants, but also the sad reality of their decline. By understanding that elephants in Africa are two distinct species, we can act to protect them using conservation strategies that respond to their unique challenges, dependent on their geographical location. Learn more about the conservation status of African elephants and how Wild Tomorrow Fund is working to support their population recovery in KwaZulu-Natal South Africa in our latest blog post below.
African savannah elephants. Photo by our Ambassador, Shannon Wild.
Did you know that there are two types of elephants in Africa? The wonderful news that African elephants are indeed two distinct species, was long suspected and finally proven with advanced research in 2001. Researchers sequenced the nuclear genomes of both types of African elephant, as well as that of the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), the extinct woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) and the mastodon (Mammut americanum). By comparing all these genomes, the team found that the forest and savanna elephants diverged into separate species between 2.6 and 5.6 million years ago. They are as different from each other as an Asian elephant or a wooly mammoth, as a tiger is from a lion. Different shades of gray you could say, and most notably very different in size, with the savanna elephant roughly double the size and weight of the smaller, more elusive, less understood forest elephant.
The wheels of IUCN species assessments move slowly. The first IUCN assessment of African elephants as two species was only published this year in March. This important research found that the remaining population of the African savannah elephant (Loxodonta africana) - the species found in southern Africa - has decreased by at least 60% over the last 50 years. This led to a revised conservation status of “Endangered”, one rung higher on the IUCN’s Red List of Threatened Species, meaning that their risk of extinction has officially increased. It’s a red alert for savanna elephants, sliding ever closer to extinction.
“If you’re not outraged, then I beg you to take a little time just learn about elephants… They’re worth fighting for and we owe it to them to protect them”
For African forest elephants, their story is even more urgent. Their plight had been obscured by the bigger and more easy to study savanna elephants. Their numbers have fallen by more than 86% over a period of 31 years. It’s a catastrophic decline that requires urgent attention. No one is sure how many forest elephants are left. Work is underway to more accurately count the forest elephants, with the results anxiously awaited later this year. This will create better understanding of how many forest elephants remain, and where. Efforts are focused on Gabon as it is thought to be home to more than 50 percent of the remaining forest elephant population, despite accounting for less than 15 percent of the species' range.
Dr. Okita, co-chair of the IUCN’s African Elephant Specialist Group, said that considering the two elephant species separately helped to reveal just how bad things are, especially for the forest elephant. “The forest elephants, in most cases, have been largely ignored,” he said in an interview with the New York Times this March. “Grouping the two elephants together probably masked just how bad things were for the forest elephant”, he said.
While saving forest elephants is an urgent priority, we also can’t lose focus on savanna elephants. What is clear from the IUCN assessments is that both species of African elephants are in trouble, deeper than we’d previously realized. A world without either of the African elephant species would be one that is vastly diminished.
In South Africa where Wild Tomorrow Fund’s work is focused, the major issue for the recovery of elephant populations is habitat. To put it simply, elephants have run out of wild space within finite, fenced reserves. That’s why we are so passionate about our wildlife corridor project. Our vision for the corridor is to reconnect two large existing reserves together, expanding and reconnecting space for elephants (and many other threatened species).
Our wildlife corridor will reconnect old pathways they may still remember. Once our fences come down, will their elders remember where to find water in the freshwater springs on our Ukuwela Reserve? By reconnecting this habitat, elephants can importantly exchange genetic information, meet ‘strangers’ and create new social connections facilitated by the physical reconnection of their landscape (read more about the emotional lives of elephants in our story on Elephant Connections).
Reversing the African elephants’ decline will require not just science, policy and hard work on the ground. It also requires reaching people around the world at an emotional level, touching their hearts on behalf of African elephants, backed by science, and asking for more support. “At the moment we are getting to the minds of the people,” Dr. Okita said. “But we need to get to the hearts.”
Learn more about our wildlife corridor project here and click the button above to help us support elephant protection in KwaZulu-Natal South Africa.