ELEPHANTS  

Elephants are very big animals. Some elephants are 4 meters tall, and weigh 6000 kg. Their life span is usually 70 years. There are two kinds of elephants: African elephants and Asian elephants. African elephants have larger ears and their ears look like Africa.

Africa is very hot.This makes elephants’ life difficult. Fortunately, their ears help them. Their big ears radiate heat. In other words, they give out the extra heat into the atmosphere. So, their ears are a kind of air-conditioner. However, sometimes it is too hot. Then, water helps elephants. They love water. When they feel too hot, they suck water into their trunks and then spray it over their bodies. They also spray dust on themselves. This cover of dust protects them from heat, too.

An elephant’s trunk is a long nose. They use it for smelling, breathing, and drinking. They also use their trunks like hands, that is, they hold and carry things with their trunks as we hold and carry things with our hands. The trunk is a very complicated organ. It has 100.000 different muscles.

Elephants also have tusks. Both* males and females have them. Their tusks are very useful for them. Using the tusks, elephants dig the ground for food and water and they get food from trees. Male elephants also use tusks when they fight other males.

Tusks, however, are not valuable for only elephants. Some people are also very interested in tusks because they sell tusks in return for a lot of money. In other words, some illegal hunters kill elephants, steal their tusks, and sell them, and make a lot of money. Of course, this is very dangerous for elephants because they can totally disappear. This is why elephant hunting is forbidden today.

Because elephants are very big, they eat a lot of food. They are herbivores, that is, they eat grass, fruit and roots. They don’t eat other animals. A big elephant eats 136 kilograms of food in one day.

They eat a lot but they do not sleep much. They usually spend a lot of their time walking and looking for food.

Female elephants live in groups with their babies. They have a long period of pregnancy, nearly 22 months. In other words, they get pregnant and then they have a baby 22 months later. Usually they have a baby every two or four years. Their babies are very big, too. A new baby elephant is about 91 kilograms and 1 meter tall.
A simplified version of the original text at National Geographic.