Hazel on Elephants (Day 159)
This is a copy of a book that Hazel (age 8) wrote about elephants as a big homeschool project. We spent a whole week with elephants in Thailand. Every day, Hazel walked around with a notepad taking notes. Later, she wrote each section of the book by hand, and then mom helped type it up. We took all the pictures ourselves. We are making real physical copies of the book. It you want one, please email us at HarmonFamily@300SummerDays.com. Enjoy!
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INTRODUCTION
When I was in Thailand I spent time at two elephant camps. My parents did a lot of research to find places where elephants were treated fairly and you could safely spend time with them while not hurting or annoying them. I rode elephants, I helped them paint, I fed them, I bathed them, I helped a vet do a checkup and went on a picnic with elephants.
I got this knowledge from an elephant expert, a mahout ( a mahout is a elephant trainer) and a vet. One fact I learned from an elephant expert is that if elephants get bored they will DANCE! One fact I learned from a mahout is that elephants can have bad moods and can also cry! One fact I learned from a vet is that just like old people elephants lose their hair (it does not turn gray).
Ever think about your relatives? One of the elephants closest land relatives is the foot long four inch tall rock hyrax! Elephants and rock hyraxes share some DNA. Some similarities are that they each walk on their tip toes and have a gel pad where their heal is. Their closest water relative is the manatee and the dugong. Elephants can’t swim, but like the dugong they are herbivores.
Read on to discover more about…
ELEPHANTS!
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POOP
A human poops out around one pound a day. An elephant poops out around 200 to 300 pounds a day and poops 8 to 10 times a day. In captivity some elephants have sensitive stomachs so they need special food. It makes it easy to see who pooped! Once an elephant is over 55 its digestive system is weaker and their poop is longer! Elephants and humans both pee for around 22 seconds.
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VET INFO
At your physical you get typical tests like your pulse or your height. At an elephants physical they get a weight test, blood check, temperature and a body score. An elephant is as smart as a five or six year old. Learning how to write with a pencil is about as easy as learning how to use your trunk. The vet told me that elephants can recognize themselves in the mirror! I also learned that they will not lay down for very long because it will hurt their organs.
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PREGNANCY AND BABIES
Hey Moms, aren’t you glad you aren’t an elephant? Elephants have to be pregnant for about two years. In the wild elephants are aware that they need to eat less the last six months of pregnancy so they can get the baby out! In captivity they make them exercise and go on a diet! If something goes wrong during labor the elephants can’t have a c-section because all of their internal organs will fall out! The moms nurse for three to five years because baby elephants cannot use their trunks.
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TRUNKS
Did you ever wonder what life would be like if your nose and upper lip were fused together? Or if one of your arms was six feet long? An elephant has both of these features! An elephants nose and upper lip combo (more commonly known as a trunk) can hold ten liters of water. Another use for a 300 pound trunk is communication. Elephants start using their trunks at about two years old. Elephants have enough dexterity to pick up a potato chip and paint with a paint brush. An elephants trunk can lift 600 pounds.
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FOOD
Humans eat about three to five pounds of food per day. We eat vitamins, fat and carbohydrates. An elephant eats 300 to 400 pounds that is mainly grass, sugar cane and bananas. They also eat leaves. They will refuse to eat chicken and peanuts. They love sunflower seeds. It usually costs about eighteen thousand dollars to feed an elephant in captivity (that is 584,059 Thai Baht and 276,422,634 Indonesian Rupiah!) At the elephant sanctuary we hid their food and since they as smart as a 5 or 6 year old they found it.
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TEETH
You have 12 molars and 2 sets of teeth. An elephant has 24 molars and 5 sets of teeth. Once they lose their last set they will die. Since each set lasts about 10 years, elephants live to about 60 (in the wild) but in captivity they can have special food made for them so they live to an older age.
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AFRICAN ELEPHANTS VS ASIAN ELEPHANTS
I was able to spend time in Africa and Asia. There are some differences and similarities between the two types of elephant species. African elephants are bigger than Asian elephants. African elephants have four toenails on the front feet and three toenails on the back feet. The African elephant has two fingers on the tip of its trunk. African elephants have bigger ears than the Asian elephants. The African elephant has one bump on its head.
The Asian elephants only have one finger on the tip of its trunk. They have smaller ears than the African elephant and they have two bumps on their head. The Asian elephant has 5 nails on their front feet and four nails on the back feet. Asian elephants have pink skin as they age.
You are not able to breed an African elephant with an Asian elephant.
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SPECIES OF ELEPHANTS
Asian
Indian
Sri Lankan
Sumatran
Bornean
African
Forest
Savanah
Plains
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KEYSTONE SPECIES
A keystone species has a large effect on the ecosystem. Without the species their ecosystem will change and suffer. A keystone species is a habitat modifier. Keystone species include sharks, sea otters, gray wolves, grizzly bears and ELEPHANTS.
An example of the elephants role is they pull down branches and eat them, this lets sunlight in to the forest and makes plants grow. This helps little animals get new food. When elephants eat seeds and later poop them out, they grow into trees in new areas.
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ENDANGERED & WILD ELEPHANTS
Many animals are endangered, the elephant is one of them. One of the main reasons the elephant is endangered in Thailand is that in 1989 logging camps were shut down and elephants were out of work. Some elephants went to the circus, some went street begging and to elephant shows. Or at least that is what the government thought, some logging camps still went on, but in secret! Today they think about 3,500 elephants are endangered. One of the reasons elephants are endangered is because they have lost their habitat to farming, another reason is poaching. There are 20,000 to 40,000 elephants left in the wild.
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CONCLUSION
I enjoyed spending time in Africa and Asia and seeing unique creatures, especially the elephant. A special moment that I had was washing the elephants, I got all wet! Something that made my experience unique was when we fed the elephants dinner and then we had ours!
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MORE
I would like to mention some facts that did not fit in the topics.
-Elephants can hear at a higher frequency than humans.
-Elephants prefer male voices to female voices.
-An elephants front feet are shaped differently than their back feet.
-Elephants can carry 1,000 pounds.
-Elephants sweat from their toes.
-Elephants cannot swim
-Sometimes older people need nurses and care, elephants are the same! In captivity the people that care for elephants are called Mahouts (ma-hoots). Being a mahout is a lifelong commitment. Mahouts live with their elephant.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hazel is 8 years old and is traveling around the world. She wrote this book to analyze her time in Asia. She wrote another book, The African Anthology, to mark her time in Africa. She thinks that elephants are interesting animals. She loved watching them clasp and hug each other’s trunks, knock down swings, bathe in mud, and spray humans with water. She also saw elephants paint drawings, play soccer and throw darts. The author is grateful she did not get a disease, her brother Hugh did get ringworm from an elephant. Hugh does not have a trunk but is a cute mammal who can also throw darts, hug, play soccer and paint. Hazel wrote this book during lockdown in New Zealand during the corona virus pandemic.
She would like to dedicate this book to everyone who taught me about elephants, for my mom for typing it, and to my parents who took me to Thailand.
