Before you embark on your once in a lifetime African Safari, it might be a good idea to read up on a little information on these intelligent giants (Pachyderms).

Under normal conditions female elephants and their juveniles live together in close family units while the mature males usually remain solitary. This matriarchal society is based on a group of related females and their young offspring but may also include some unrelated individuals that have joined the group. A family group usually consists Levitra Professional of anywhere between 2 and 40 elephants with the females normally remaining within this family for the rest of Viagra Professional their lives. Different family groups often join together to form larger herds of elephants with the matriarch in most cases being the oldest mother. The older females will take charge of most situations like the protection of the herd because of their years of knowledge and experience.

After a successful mating session the mother will have a gestation period of 22 months. Baby elephants grow up very much like humans as they only start to mature in their teen years and going through a similar adolescence. This long childhood gives the young elephant’s sufficient time to learn all the skills needed to survive in the wild. Young pre-teen females often act as babysitters to all the older mothers enabling them to find enough time to eat properly and therefore provide better quality milk for their calves. These complex family and group alliances result in the fact that families with dominant and older matriarchs have much higher sexual reproductive success than groups with younger less experienced matriarchs. There is also a much higher survival rate in larger groups with many young female babysitters.

Elephant bulls live separately from the female and juveniles with the teenage bull usually leaving the herd at about the age of 14 or 15 to join their older male counterparts. For the next 16 to 18 years these young males grow and mature until they can finally compete successfully for females and this only happens over the age of 35.These bulls will then continue to grow physically bigger and stronger for most of their lives, continually improving the chances of mating successfully.

Elephants communicate between each other using a complex series of different sounds. Although there is a lot of new research being done on elephant communication, there is still much we do not understand. These mammals will generally vary the pitch of their rumbling and trumpeting according to the situation. When things are calm and there is no sense of danger then the sounds are fairly low pitch. When they get excited or there is some sort of danger then the trumpeting becomes much higher in pitch and also a lot louder. Finally these magnificent canadian propecia beasts are also able to communicate sub-sonically, producing sounds that our limited human ears are unable to pick up.

Author Bio: Jason Wiltshire of The South Africa Travel Company has 10 years of tourism experience. His company’s expertise covers accommodation, Cape Town day tours, Garden Route holidays, Safaris and golf packages. For their professional services go to www.southafricatravelsite.com or jwtravel2000@gmail.com

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