WHAT LEVISON WOOD TAUGHT ME ABOUT ELEPHANTS

The Last Giants: The Rise and Fall of the African Elephant is a beautiful, heartbreaking, and illuminating book by Levison Wood, a man who is often regarded one of the best explorers of the 21st Century. In this book, we find out more about the psychological, emotional, and physical aspects of these animals, along with the reasons why they are dying out so rapidly and what we can do to stop it.

The book is full of interesting stories, personal experiences, and horrifying facts, all blended together with Wood’s effortless writing and clear love for the African Elephant. It details just how remarkable these creatures are, and if I’m being honest, it seems as though the only reason that elephants have managed to survive for so long is due to their sheer ability to adapt and overcome. When they are facing incredible heat waves, they can dilate and constrict the blood vessels in their massive ears, cooling the blood by approximately three degrees. When one set of teeth becomes worn down, another of their six sets will move forward to replace it. The only obstacle that elephants cannot get over, it seems, is human interference.

In regards to the ivory industry, it is suggested that 20,000 elephants are killed each year for their tusks, seemingly to the point of no return. If we continue poaching at the current rate, future generations will have no clue as to what an African Elephant even was. Wood tells the story of a filmmaker who spent four years in Tsavo recording an elephant called Satao, who would hide his massive tusks as he walked. Satao travelled by zigzagging between bushes and shoving his head and tusks into each bush as he reached them, suggesting that he was aware of the dangers of owning tusks. Studies have shown that elephants are actually evolving to have smaller tusks, or to be born without any tusks at all – which is actually pretty awful, as elephants use their tusks to dig for water in droughts, lift heavy objects, and pull back the bark from trees to consume (which ultimately creates houses for smaller animals such as lizards, keeping the biodiversity flourishing). It seems as though humans are forcing these elephants into an even tighter rut by being the root cause of this evolution.

Wood talks a lot about the roles that males and females play in elephant society, making it glaringly obvious just how similar to us they are. Matriarchs are everything within the society, being the key to the survival of the rest of the species. They are the ones responsible for making the decisions for the rest of the herd, educating young elephants on how to take care of the young, which males to avoid, and how to entice a mate with a walk called ‘oestrus.’ They pass down knowledge about predators, the best places to get water in a drought, and where to take the young on play dates, so that they grow up to be social, intelligent, well-integrated members of society.

Elephant calves spend around 22 months in the womb, and go through very long periods of childhood simply because they have so much to learn. A young elephant is brought up with so much love and support from its family members – mothers and sisters adjusting the vegetation around or the sleeping position of a youngster to make them more comfortable, and protecting them with their lives against predators and threats – that it’s hard to see them as anything but the caring, intelligent, empathetic creatures they are. When eating around young elephants, older elephants are known to eat from higher branches so that they can still get enough food, often prioritising the health of the children and the vulnerable over themselves. Wood mentions one experience he had when he was watching two males play fighting in Kenya, noticing that one of the bulls was crippled. In response, the other bull had gotten down on his knees to play, staying like that for the duration of the game – literally to level the field. 

This care and awareness doesn’t just affect other elephants. Wood talks about the story of a man called Lawrence, who had slowly built a relationship with an elephant called Nana. This elephant trusted and respected him so much that when she bore a child she took it to him so he could see it. In turn, when he had a child, he took it to her family, and they responded by trumpeting in joyous unison and throwing their trunks in the air to smell the scent. It seems that they understand and feel a lot more than humans could ever fully understand.

Elephants are known for being very intelligent – they have great cognitive skills, and can recognise different groups of people just by their scent and sound. Wood talks about one particular experiment where the Amboseli elephants were presented with red coloured cloths worn either by a Maasai warrior (who occasionally spear elephants) and a local Kamba man, and they could determine the difference between the two people by their smell, rapidly fleeing the area and heading to an area of greater cover when presented with cloths from the Maasai. Similarly, they can recognise people by sound, and when recordings of these two groups of people speaking in their native language were played around the elephants, their response was heightened when listening to Maasai men speaking in their native languages. This reaction was specific to the age and sex of the warrior, with far less fear shown towards woman and boys than adult men.

The main reasons that elephants are dying out so rapidly are heavy poaching for ivory, loss of habitats and conflict with people over land use, and manipulation of populations by humans. As the world’s human population has doubled in the last fifty years, and more than trebled in Africa, one of the biggest threats to habitat is the encroachment of human societies. Africa’s population will double again in the next thirty years, and it will soar to 4.4. billion people by the end of the century. By contrast, the population of African Elephants has fallen by more than 90% in a little over one century.

The Last Giants: The Rise and Fall of the African Elephant is the sort of book that leaves you feeling haunted, vividly aware of the goings on in the world around you, and yet still shocked that we could have allowed this to happen. Honestly, it’s a pretty horrifying read, pointing out how undeniable it is that humans are to blame for their mass demise. Elephants are such intelligent, beautiful, and complex creatures, and it’s very disappointing that we’ve allowed this to happen. Luckily, there are some things we can do.

Starting with charities such as Tusk, we can make sure that these organisations that are prioritising the preservation of these creatures are being promoted and supported as much as possible. We can avoid zoos and boycott circuses that use live elephants in their performances, and steer clear of the purchasing of ivory. But the most important thing is to educate ourselves and others around us – as with awareness comes action. One of the best places to start is by reading The Last Giants: The Rise and Fall of the African Elephant. This review really is just the tip of the iceberg.