Cerling worked with Iain Douglas-Hamilton of Save the Elephant Fund in Nairobi, Kenya, whose team collared the animals and mapped the wanderings of the seven elephants for two years.
While changing batteries in the elephants' collars, biologists took hair samples from the elephants' tails, which contain the chemical signatures of grasses, trees, and shrubs, among other things, eaten over the course of years.
The scientists found that of the seven elephants, six — two males and four females — remained within the arid lowlands of the Samburu National Reserve, dining mostly on trees and shrubs. In the rainy season, the elephants consumed freshly sprouting grasses.
The seventh elephant, a 40-year-old bull named Lewis, stayed in the Sumburu during the rainy season to graze on the tender grasses, but when the climate grew dry, he migrated 25 to 35 miles into the highlands of Mount Kenya's Imenti Forest, where he indulged not only on shrubs and trees but on the crops of farmers.
"Diet is very important for bull elephants," said Douglas-Hamilton. "If they are to succeed in sexual contests for females, they need high-quality food to build up their strength, hence the reason for high-risk crop raiding."
Unfortunately, Lewis's strategy did not pay off and he was shot and killed, presumably by a farmer.
"The human-animal conflict is a problem that we face everywhere in the elephants' range," said program officer Matthew Lewis, who works in species conservation at the World Wildlife Fund.
Lewis is part of a team using GPS to track pygmy elephants in the dense forests of Borneo to determine what areas should be preserved.
"If we're able to tie together their movement and their behavior, hopefully we can mitigate the conflict," he said.
Cerling and scientists from Save the Elephants Fund are currently working to broaden the scope of their research to include the 28 other collared elephants, a mere fraction of the hundreds of elephants living in the Samburu National Reserve.
Name: African Elephant (
Loxodonta africana)
Primary Classification: Proboscidea (Elephants)
Location: Africa
Habitat: Wide range, including desert, scrub, savanna and high rainforest
Diet: Bark, fruit, grass and leaves
Size: Up to 16 ft in length, 13 ft in height, and 11 tons in weight
Description: Gray, sparsely haired skin; large ears, which aid in temperature regulation; long, forward-curving ivory tusks, used for fighting, digging and eating; long, muscular trunk with two finger-like projections at the tip.
Cool Facts: It is the largest land mammal on Earth. It takes care of weak and injured pack members and grieves over dead companions. It has a particular fascination with the tusks and bones of dead elephants.
Conservation Status: Endangered
Major Threat: Poaching
What Can I Do?: Visit
Save the Elephants, the
African Wildlife Foundation, and the
Living With Elephants Foundation for information on how you can help endangered elephants.
