10 most-asked elephant questions—answered by an expert

Meet the experts

This episode features WWF conservation experts Nilanga Jayasinghe and Dr. Cody Aylward, who discuss the importance of advancing practical, people-centered approaches to human-elephant coexistence and of protecting connected habitats for elephants.

• Nilanga Jayasinghe, Director, Asia Wildlife, Wildlife Conservation
• Dr. Cody Aylward, Senior Specialist, Connectivity and Wildlife Conservation

Transcript:

Hey everyone, I'm Callie from World Wildlife Fund, and today we're answering your most pressing questions about elephants. Welcome back to Wildlife Café. Grab a coffee or tea and get excited about elephants for today's conservation coffee chat.

1. Where do elephants live?

There are three living species of elephants across Asia and Africa.

First is the Asian elephant, which inhabits forests and grasslands across 13 countries in South and Southeast Asia. Asian elephants include four recognized subspecies: the Indian elephant, Sri Lankan elephant, Sumatran elephant, and Bornean elephant.

In Africa, there are two subspecies: the African savanna elephant and the African forest elephant. The African savanna elephant is the largest elephant species and is found across the grasslands, savannas, and woodlands of sub-Saharan Africa. The African forest elephant is smaller than its savanna relative, with rounder ears and straighter, downward-pointing tusks. It lives in the dense tropical forests of West and Central Africa, with strongholds in countries such as Gabon and the Republic of Congo.

Despite living in different habitats across two continents, all elephant species share complex social lives. Females and calves typically live in family groups led by an experienced older female known as the matriarch. Adult males usually live alone or form small bachelor groups, joining female herds primarily for breeding.

2. What do elephants eat?

Elephants are herbivores, and all three species eat mostly plant-based diets built around grasses, leaves, bark, roots, fruit, twigs, and other vegetation. Because they are so large, elephants need lots of food, water, and space to feed. On average, an elephant can feed for up to 18 hours and consume hundreds of pounds of plant matter in a single day.

Their constant feeding actually makes them a keystone species in their habitats. As they move through ecosystems, they shape the landscape. In tropical forests, elephants create clearings and gaps in the canopy that encourage tree regeneration and clear pathways in dense vegetation that allow passage for other animals. In the savannas, they reduce bush cover to create a mix of open grassland and vegetation that benefits many different animals. An elephant footprint can also enable a micro-ecosystem that, when filled with water over time, can provide a home for tadpoles and other organisms.

The seeds of many plant species in Central African and Asian forests depend on passing through an elephant's digestive tract before they can germinate, and the dung provides fertilization. Some plant species across Africa and Asia, like elephant apple, wild jackfruit, and wild guava, have become so specialized that they rely on elephants to disperse their seeds.

3. How do elephants use their trunks?

Elephants use their trunks like an all-purpose tool. They grab food, suck up water and spray it into their mouths, breathe, smell, communicate, and touch or comfort other elephants. It's as if our hands and nose were combined into one appendage. Sounds weird, but also kind of cool?

Their trunks are also incredibly sensitive and dexterous, so they can pick up tiny objects or strip leaves from branches while also acting like a snorkel when they swim or cross water.

4. Are elephants smart, and do elephants have a good memory?

Yes, elephants are very smart animals, and their memory is especially impressive. Research describes them as capable of remembering family members, recognizing threats, and recalling important places like water sources and migration routes, which help them survive in changing environments. Older matriarchs can guide herds using experience from past droughts, and elephants can recognize familiar individuals and even distinguish potentially dangerous human voices.

Fun fact: they're also one of a small group of mammals that can recognize themselves in a mirror!

5. How do elephants communicate, and what do they sound like?

Elephants communicate in many ways. They rumble, trumpet, squeak, and growl, but they also use body language, touch, smell, and even ground vibrations to pass information to one another. Their low-frequency rumbles can travel long distances, and they can detect seismic vibrations through the ground, which helps herds stay connected and respond to danger even when they're far apart.

6. Do elephants cry and mourn their dead?

Yes. Because of their highly social nature, losing a member of the herd can lead to behaviors like mourning. Elephants do get visibly distraught during traumatic incidents. You may even see tears flowing from their eyes—though we can't distinctly say that they are crying in the human sense, they do seem to mourn their dead. Researchers have observed them touching, sniffing, nudging, guarding, and sometimes remaining quiet near the body or bones of dead herd members, behaviors that strongly suggest grief-like responses.

They also vocalize during these moments, and because elephants communicate with low-frequency rumbles and even seismic vibrations through the ground, a death in the herd can be shared not just by sound and touch but through vibrational communication as well.

7. Rapid fire: five invigorating elephant facts

• Do elephants like peanuts? Not especially—that's mostly a pop culture myth, and peanuts are not a natural staple of their diet.
• Are elephants afraid of mice? No, not in any deep sense, though they can be startled by quick, unexpected movement near their feet.
• Can elephants jump? Nope. Their body structure and sheer mass don't allow all four feet to leave the ground at once.
• Do elephants swim? Yes, and they're pretty good at it. They paddle with all four legs and keep their trunks above water like a snorkel. In the wild, they may swim across rivers, lakes, and even between islands to cool off or play.
• Do female elephants have tusks? Both male and female African elephants grow tusks, but only male Asian elephants do. Female Asian elephants grow “tushes”—smaller teeth that protrude but aren't quite tusks. Today only about 10% of Asian elephant males grow tusks, since poachers have historically targeted individuals with them.

8. Are elephants aggressive or dangerous, and are they friendly to humans?

Callie: This is a really important question. Let's let Asian elephant expert Nilanga Jayasinghe answer this one. Hey, Nilanga.

Nilanga Jayasinghe: Thanks, Callie. Historically, in Asia, elephants avoided people for the most part. But now, because they're increasingly coming into contact with people due to habitat loss and increasing overlap of shared spaces, it's harder for them to avoid humans. So over time, these encounters have also become increasingly negative. Because elephants feed on crops and destroy property, people use aggressive methods like chasing to drive elephants away, and these kinds of experiences have, over time, led to elephants becoming aggressive towards people in turn.

Nilanga Jayasinghe: But it's also really important to remember that elephant responses to people depend on their individual characteristics—each elephant has its own personality that comes into play in these encounters. Some elephants are gentle and don't harm people, even in human-dominated landscapes, while others can be more aggressive. In general, elephants are wild animals, and their responses are unpredictable. As such, they deserve distance, caution, and respect—if you go to see them in the wild, please give them their space and watch from a safe distance.

Callie: Thanks, Nilanga.

1. Are elephants endangered?

Yes, elephants are endangered. African savanna elephants are classified as endangered, while African forest elephants are critically endangered, meaning they face an extremely high risk of extinction in the wild. Asian elephants are also endangered, though the Sumatran elephant subspecies is critically endangered.

Elephant populations have declined dramatically over the past century. In Africa, numbers have fallen from an estimated twelve million elephants to roughly four hundred and fifty thousand today. Between 1964 and 2016, forest elephant populations declined by about ninety percent, while savanna elephant populations dropped by around seventy percent—an average decline of seventy-seven percent across African elephants.

In Asia, elephant populations have dropped from more than 100,000 a century ago to fewer than 50,000 today. Most of the remaining elephants are found in South Asia, with only about 8,000 to 11,000 wild individuals surviving across Southeast Asia and China.

1. So why are elephants in trouble?

For both African and Asian elephants, habitat loss and fragmentation pose by far the biggest threat. Elephants have less room to roam than ever before as expanding human populations convert land for agriculture, settlements, and development. Commercial logging, mining, and plantations not only destroy habitats but also open access to remote forests for poachers. Increasing infrastructure development—roads, railways, and other structures—is fragmenting habitats and impacting connectivity for elephants and other wildlife. Poverty, armed conflict, and the displacement of people by civil conflict also add to habitat loss and fragmentation, pushing elephants into smaller islands of protected areas and hindering their freedom to roam.

Today, on average, seventy-five percent of Asian elephants are found outside of protected areas, since they have lost ninety-five percent of their historic habitat. Similarly, African elephants have lost approximately seventy-five percent of their historic range.

All of this leads to increased negative interactions between humans and elephants, known as human-elephant conflict. When elephants move through human settlements and agricultural areas, they consume crops and sometimes destroy property. These interactions, which are on the rise, are often negative, leading to crop and property loss, injury, and death—impacts that may cause humans to retaliate against elephants, often with lethal outcomes.

Another ongoing threat to elephants is the illegal ivory trade. Poachers kill elephants for their tusks, and criminal networks profit from selling ivory, which is smuggled across borders through complex trafficking routes used by organized crime groups. Many consumers purchase ivory items as decorations, collectibles, gifts, or symbols of status, and because people continue to buy ivory, demand remains strong, putting elephant populations at risk. The most recent elephant poaching crisis peaked about ten years ago, though poaching is still a problem today.

So what is WWF doing?

Callie: At WWF, we are working to ensure a future where elephants and people can thrive together.

First, we focus on protecting and reconnecting elephant habitats, restoring wildlife corridors, and improving land use planning so elephants can continue to move safely across the landscapes they have used for generations. To do this, we must first understand how elephants move through and use their habitats. Scientists on our team collect GPS collaring data to understand how elephants move through their environments, identifying essential movement corridors. This data is the first step to ensuring elephants have the space and resources they need.

Callie: Here's Dr. Cody Aylward, a connectivity expert, to tell us more. Hey, Cody!

Dr. Cody Aylward: Thanks, Callie. Elephants require huge spaces to gather the resources they need for survival. They can travel hundreds of kilometers each year to find food, water, and mates, so a single national park often isn't big enough. Instead, they rely on natural corridors—safe routes that allow them to travel between parks. The tricky part is figuring out where these corridors are, and that's where GPS collars come in. By tracking elephants over months and years, we can see the pathways they choose and which obstacles prevent them from moving, such as fences or roads. For example, our GPS collars in the Kavango Zambezi landscape in Southern Africa have shown us that some fences completely block elephant movement, so it's important to keep the most critical movement corridors as clear of fencing as possible.

Dr. Cody Aylward: But putting a collar on an elephant requires a lot of resources and hasn't yet been done in many places where elephants live, so we have other tools we can use to find and protect these corridors. Collaring is especially challenging in the forests of Southeast Asia, where elephant populations are small and fragmented, and connectivity is critical to their survival. There, we're using tools such as camera traps and elephant dung to understand connectivity. Dung contains a surprising amount of information: by analyzing elephant DNA in their dung, we can map which populations are interbreeding and which are not, telling us where connectivity remains and where it has been lost. We can also analyze the plant DNA in their dung to see which plants elephants like to eat, which lets us choose their favorite foods when we plant new corridors to restore connectivity.

Dr. Cody Aylward: Back to you, Callie.

Callie: Thanks, Cody. We also work closely with communities that live alongside elephants to help reduce conflict and support long-term coexistence. That includes practical solutions like early warning systems, community response teams, low-cost electric fencing, and education programs that help prevent dangerous encounters between people and elephants. At the same time, we are addressing some of the root causes of conflict, such as habitat loss, improving our understanding of the social factors involved, and advocating for policies that support effective long-term conflict management.

Reducing human-elephant conflict is a major focus of Elly Allies, an initiative WWF launched three years ago on World Elephant Day. The program focuses on Southeast Asia and China, where the need for elephant conservation is especially great. Working alongside governments, local communities, businesses, development organizations, NGOs, and other partners, Elly Allies aims to restore and reconnect elephant habitat, improve conflict management, and help prevent further population declines.

Through Elly Allies, WWF is also promoting wildlife-friendly infrastructure in countries where elephants live, aiming to reduce the impact of roads, railways, and other development projects on elephant movement and habitat connectivity, helping both people and wildlife thrive.

Callie: This is really exciting work. Let's hear from Nilanga again to tell us more about it. Hey again, Nilanga!

Nilanga Jayasinghe: Thanks again, Callie. There are some exciting things happening in the world of wildlife-friendly infrastructure as it relates to Asian elephants, because the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's Asian Elephant Specialist Group and Connectivity Conservation Specialist Group came together and developed the Asian Elephant Transport Working Group. About two years ago, this group published a guidance document called the Handbook to Mitigate the Impacts of Roads and Railways on Asian Elephants, which looks to reduce the impacts that roads, railways, and other infrastructure can have on connectivity for elephants, including direct impacts like elephant mortality.

Nilanga Jayasinghe: This document is a best-practice manual that provides actual engineering specifications on mitigation measures like underpasses or overpasses—what would be best suited to allow elephants and other wildlife to cross safely without encountering cars and other vehicles on roads and railways.

Nilanga Jayasinghe: We've already conducted four workshops in range countries including Bhutan, Malaysia, Cambodia, and Indonesia, thinking through what wildlife-friendly infrastructure means for each country. This document and these workshops have been a great way to bring together governments, funders, engineers, other NGOs, and various stakeholders to collaborate on a sustainable, wildlife-friendly infrastructure agenda in these countries. We're hopeful that this guidance can influence future sustainability in infrastructure measures moving forward. Thank you so much.

Callie: Thanks again, Nilanga!

Lastly, protecting elephants also means tackling poaching and the illegal wildlife trade. WWF supports anti-poaching patrols, helps strengthen wildlife law enforcement, and works with governments, technology companies, and conservation partners to reduce demand for elephant ivory and other elephant products.

WWF works to protect elephants by addressing the consumer demand that fuels the illegal ivory trade. Through research, behavior change campaigns, and partnerships with governments, businesses, and civil society, WWF seeks to reduce the desire for ivory products by helping consumers understand the impact of their purchases on elephant populations. By changing attitudes, shifting social norms, and encouraging people to reject ivory as a symbol of status or luxury, WWF is working to remove the financial incentive that drives poaching and trafficking and help secure a future for elephants in the wild.

Because elephants are keystone species that help shape and sustain ecosystems, protecting them also helps safeguard countless other plants and animals that share their habitats.

So what can you do?

Even if you don't live anywhere near elephants, you can still help protect them.

First, never buy products made from ivory or other elephant body parts, like tail hair or skin. If you see them online, report them directly to the platform or through the Coalition to End Wildlife Trafficking online. When you travel to places where you can see elephants, make sure you see them in the wild and observe their interesting behaviors from a safe distance.

Second, share what you've learned with your friends, family, and anyone who will listen, and visit our website to learn more about elephants. The more people know, the more they will care, and the better we can be at protecting elephants.

If you care about wildlife, make sure to like, follow, and share this video. Now go out and amaze your friends with some awesome elephant facts. We'll see you again for our next Conservation Coffee Chat on Wildlife Café.

Have a favorite elephant fact we didn't mention today? Let us know in the comments!