Name That Elephant: How to Identify Elephants in the Wild

 

Veins, a Unique Elephant Fingerprint



Photograph Courtesy of ElephantVoices

 

Sharp photographs in good light reveal the pattern of veins on an elephant’s ears, which are as unique as our human fingerprints. “With a bit of sleuthing,” Poole said, “even years and new notches and tears later, an elephant can be reidentified using these vein patterns.”

Tusks

 



Photograph Courtesy of ElephantVoices

An elephant’s tusks don’t start to take shape until they are around eight to ten years old. Tusks vary in shape and size: They may curve upward, grow inward, go straight down, or be missing altogether. Tusks may break and grow back too, which makes them less reliable than ears, Poole said. Kegol (meaning “powerful and strong” in the Maasai language), the large adult male at right, has tusks that are convergent, or curve inward, while Big Mama, the large female at left, has straighter tusks, with the left tusk shorter.

It is rare for a male African elephant to be “tuskless,” but this inherited trait is seen in females. Since poachers kill elephants with tusks, the degree of tusklessness is a good indicator of the level of ivory poaching a population has experienced. “Sadly this trait is increasing across Africa,” said Poole, “but we can’t depend on this inherited trait to save elephants from extinction since, as it is a sex-linked gene, it doesn’t protect males.”

Source: Posted by Christy Ullrich of National Geographic in A Voice for Elephants on August 16, 2013 http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2013/08/16/name-that-elephant-how-to-identify-elephants-in-the-wild/