Though many hunters, prior to and even after reintroduction, claimed that wolves would wipe out entire populations of elk, deer and other ungulates, most ecosystems where wolves have been reintroduced have actually become much healthier than they were before. Since Wolves have arrived, the food chain within the Yellowstone ecosystem has been re-ordered to deliver a banquet that favors a more varied array of species. Prior to wolves, high numbers of elk were linked to declines in aspen and willow communities, which negatively affected beaver and moose. Pre-wolf, coyote numbers swelled, affecting small rodent populations, foxes, and the production of pronghorn antelope. Pre-wolf scavengers had slimmer pickings. Today with wolves taking elk, reducing their numbers, and leaving more carcasses on the landscape, grizzlies and wolverines have easier access to more meat, meaning a better chance


educing their numbers, and leaving more carcasses on the landscape, grizzlies and wolverines have easier access to more meat, meaning a better chance for larger litters of cubs and pups. Coyote numbers have been significantly reduced, meaning more mice and pocket gophers for foxes and avian predators like hawks and eagles.    Wolves play an undeniably important role in the environment and through education organizations some people may be slowly getting the message that they are vital. In addition, reports have been published placing the value of revenue from wolf-watching as upward of $25 million.


The British Government signed conventions in the 1980's and 1990's, agreeing to consider reintroducing wolves and to promote public awareness about them. Being party to European conventions, the British government is obligated to study the desirability of reintroducing extinct species and to consider reintroducing wolves. Although there are indications that wolves are recolonizing areas in Western Europe, they are unable to return to their former ranges in Britain without active human assistance.


The Scottish Highlands are one of the few large areas in western Europe with a relatively tiny human population, thus ensuring that wolves would suffer little disturbance from human activity.


One popular argument in favour of the reintroduction is that the Highland's red deer populations have overpopulated and a reintroduction of wolves would aid in keeping their numbers down, thus allowing the native flora some respite. Other arguments include the generation of income and local employment in the Highlands through wolf ecotourism which could replace the declining and uneconomical Highland sheep industry.  /ref>


Wolf sneaking to the sheepfold past a sleeping shepherd, Aberdeen Bestiary, 12th century


As long as there is enough prey, wolves seem to avoid taking livestock, often ignoring them entirely.    However, some wolves or packs can specialize in hunting livestock once the behavior is learned despite natural prey abundance. In such situations, sheep are usually the most vulnerable, but horses and cattle are also at risk. Wolf-secure fences, relocation where applicable and sometimes hunting wolves are the only known methods to effectively stop livestock predation.


Wolves have been known to commit acts of surplus killing when within the confines of human made livestock shelters. Rare incidents of surplus killing by wolves in Minnesota are reported to leave up to 35 sheep killed and injured in flocks and losses of 50 to 200 birds in turkey flocks.


Large domestic animals such as cattle or yak are killed by biting at the shoulders and flanks. A trail of blood and patches of hair are often evident. Individual wolves and small packs sometimes concentrate on the flank and hind legs. The prey is often left to weaken, being fed upon once it falls. Wolf bites usually causes damage deep in the underlying tissues. Cattle severely injured by wolves often appear dazed and are reluctant to move due to the deep pain. Wolves usually feed on cattle at the kill site, with parts sometimes being carried off. Wolves prefer to feed on the viscera and hind legs of domestic prey, though bones are often chewed and broken.


Wolves usually disregard size or age on medium sized prey such as sheep and goats. Injuries may include a crushed skull, severed spine, disembowelment and massive tissue damage. Wolves will also kill sheep by attacking the throat, similar to the manner in which a coyote kills sheep. Wolf kills however, can be distinguished by the fact that they damage the underlying tissue much more. Surplus killing often occurs.


Over several centuries, shepherds and dog breeders have used selective breeding to "create" large livestock-guarding dogs that can stand up to wolves preying on flocks.    In the U.S., in light of the gray wolf and other large predators having recently been reintroduced to certain areas, the United States Department of Agriculture has been looking into the use of breeds such as the Akbash from Turkey, the Maremma from Italy, the Great Pyrenees from France, and the Kuvasz from Hungary, among others, to help limit wolf-livestock interactions. Wolves however have been known to kill dogs. It has been theorized that wolves view dogs as competitors, which explains why the majority of attacked pets are usually hunting dogs unwittingly entering the wolf's turf.    In some instances, wolves have displayed an uncharacteristic fearlessness of humans and buildings when attacking dogs, to an extent w


wolf's turf.    In some instances, wolves have displayed an uncharacteristic fearlessness of humans and buildings when attacking dogs, to an extent where they have to be beaten off or killed.    Few dogs can hold their own against lone wolves, let alone wolf packs. Notable exceptions include specially bred Livestock guardian dogs, though their primary function has more to do with intimidating the wolves rather than fighting them.    Conversely, wolves have on occasion been known to mate with dogs to produce mix-breed offspring known as wolfdogs. Although there has been concern that European wolf populations may have extensively hybridized with stray dogs, truly significant genetic contamination of dog genes into wild wolf populations has not been confirmed. The extent of physical and behavioural differences between dogs and wolves is usually great enough to ensure that mating is unlikel


ot been confirmed. The extent of physical and behavioural differences between dogs and wolves is usually great enough to ensure that mating is unlikely and hybrid offspring rarely survive to reproduce in the wild.


In some areas across the world, hunters or state officials will hunt wolves from helicopters or light planes to control populations (or for sport in some instances), citing it as the most effective way to control wolf numbers, given that traditional poisons are largely banned. The method is used where interactions between livestock and wolves are common, or where sport or subsistence hunters desire more game animals with less competition. Aerial hunting is seen as highly controversial. In areas where aerial hunting is used to limit livestock-wolf interactions or to boost populations of game animals, arguments against it are usually centered around whether or not the reasons behind such predator elimination are scientifically valid.


Other, non- or less-lethal methods of protecting livestock from wolves have been under development for the past decade. Such methods include rubber ammunition and use of guard animals.


While wolf predation on livestock does happen, loss of livestock by wolves makes up only a small percentage of total losses in North America. Since the state of Montana began recording livestock losses due to wolves back in 1987, only 1,200 sheep and cattle have been killed. 1,200 killings in twenty years is not very significant when in the greater Yellowstone region 8,300 cattle and 13,000 sheep die from natural causes. According to the International Wolf Center, a Minnesota-based organization:   Furthermore, Jim Dutcher, a film maker who raised a captive wolf pack observed that wolves are very reluctant to try meat that they have not eaten or seen another wolf eat before possibly explaining why livestock depredation is unlikely except for in cases of desperation.


in cases of desperation.


The results however differ in some Old World countries. Greece for example reports that between April 1989 and June 1991, 21000 sheep and goats plus 2729 cattle were killed. In 1998 it was 5894 sheep and goats, 880 cattle and very few horses.


A study on livestock predation taken in Tibet showed that the wolf was the most prominent predator, accounting for 60% of the total livestock losses, followed by the snow leopard (38%) and lynx (2%). Goats were the most frequent victims (32%), followed by sheep (30%), yak (15%), and horses (13%). Wolves killed horses significantly more and goats less than would be expected from their relative abundance.  "Carnivore-Caused Livestock Mortality in Trans-Himalaya"  In 1987, Kazakhstan reported over 150,000 domestic livestock losses to wolves, with 200,000 being reported a year later.


How Wolves may be caught with a Snare, 15th century.


Wolves are frequently trapped, in the areas where it is legal, using snares or leg hold traps. Wolf trapping has come under heavy fire from animal rights groups, who allege that unskilled trappers can create unnecessary suffering for the animal involved.    Proponents counter that trapping, using the right tools and equipment, can be considered as humane as traditional hunting.


A radio-collared wolf.


Wolves are also bred for their fur in a very few locations, but they are considered as a rather problematic animal to breed, and, combined with the low value of the pelt, most fur farms utilize other animals. Wolves' varied coats make it difficult to create fur coats.


It is known that some Native American tribes would occasionally raise wolf pups for their fur. The pelt served as a shield against the cold and as an important addition to rituals.  Eskimoes tend to prefer dog skin over that of wolves, seeing as the latter is less resistant to wear and tear.


Biologists may also trap wolves for research purposes. Darting and foot hold traps are the tools of choice for such professionals, who often use these and similar techniques to fit wolves and other animals with collars holding radio transmitters and to check their health before releasing them. Use of such technology also allows them to keep track of population numbers and dispersal trends, among other things. Radio collars can also be used to monitor wolves when they come near livestock, and to identify a wolf or a pack that preys on livestock, allowing proper action to be prompter and more accurate.


Extinct Gray wolves:


Historical wolves


Other extant and extinct canid species also known as wolves:


Dog breeds with recent wolf ancestry:


Elephants (Elephantidae) are a family in the order Proboscidea in the class Mammalia. They were once classified along with other thick skinned animals in a now invalid order, Pachydermata. There are three living species: the African Bush Elephant, the African Forest Elephant (until recently known collectively as the African Elephant), and the Asian Elephant (also known as the Indian Elephant). Other species have become extinct since the last ice age, which ended about 10,000 years ago, the Mammoth being the most well-known of these.


The word "elephant" has its origins in the Greek á¼Î»ÎÏÎ±Ï, meaning "ivory" or "elephant".


Elephants are mammals, and the largest land animals alive today.    The elephant's gestation period is 22 months, the longest of any land animal. At birth it is common for an elephant calf to weigh 120 kilograms (265 lb).  An elephant may live as long as 70 years, sometimes longer. The largest elephant ever recorded was shot in Angola in 1956. This male weighed about 12,000 kg (26,400 lb),    with a shoulder height of 4.2 m (13.8 ft), a metre (3 ft 4 in) taller than the average male African elephant.    The smallest elephants, about the size of a calf or a large pig, were a prehistoric species that lived on the island of Crete during the Pleistocene epoch. Bate, D.M.A. 1907. On Elephant Remains from Crete, with Description of Elephas creticus sp.n. Proc. zool. Soc. London: 238-250.


us sp.n. Proc. zool. Soc. London: 238-250.


Elephants are symbols of wisdom in Asian cultures, and are famed for their memory and high intelligence, and are thought to be on par with cetaceans    and hominids   . Aristotle once said the elephant was "the beast which passeth all others in wit and mind."


Elephants are increasingly threatened by human intrusion and poaching. Once numbering in the millions, the African elephant population has dwindled to between 470,000 and 690,000 individuals.    The elephant is now a protected species worldwide, with restrictions in place on capture, domestic use, and trade in products such as ivory. Elephants generally have no natural predators, although lions may take calves and occasionally adults. A. J. Loveridge, J. E. Hunt, F. Murindagomo   D. W. Macdonald. (2006) Influence of drought on predation of elephant (Loxodonta africana) calves by lions (Panthera leo) in an African wooded savannah. Journal of Zoology 270:3, 523â530     In some areas, lions may regularly take to preying on elephants. Hemson, Graham (2003) The Ecology and Conservation of Lions: Human-Wildlife Conflict in semi-arid Botswana. Ph. D. Thesis, University of Oxford.


Graham (2003) The Ecology and Conservation of Lions: Human-Wildlife Conflict in semi-arid Botswana. Ph. D. Thesis, University of Oxford.


Comparative view of the human and elephant frames, c1860.


The African Elephant genus contains two (or, arguably, three) living species; whereas, the Asian Elephant species is the only surviving member of its genus, but can be subdivided into four subspecies.


African elephants, at up to 4 m (13 ft 1 in) tall and weighing 7500 kg (8.27 short tons), are usually  larger than the Asian species and they have bigger ears. Both male and female African elephants have long tusks, while their Asian counterparts have shorter ones, with those of females vanishingly small. African elephants have a dipped back, smooth forehead and two "fingers" at the tip of their trunks, whereas the Asian have an arched back, two humps on the forehead and only one "finger" at the tip of their trunks.


African elephants are further subdivided into two populations, the Savanna and Forest, and recent genetic studies have led to a reclassification of these as separate species, the forest population now being called Loxodonta cyclotis, and the Savanna (or Bush) population termed Loxodonta africana. This reclassification has important implications for conservation, because it means that where previously it was assumed that a single and endangered species comprised two small populations, if in reality these are two separate species, then as a consequence, both could be  more gravely endangered than a more numerous and wide-ranging single species might have been. There is also a potential danger in that, if the forest elephant is not explicitly listed as an endangered species, poachers and smugglers might be able to evade the law forbidding trade in endangered animals and their body parts.


listed as an endangered species, poachers and smugglers might be able to evade the law forbidding trade in endangered animals and their body parts.


The Forest elephant and the Savanna elephant can hybridise â that is, breed together â successfully, though their preferences for different terrains reduce such opportunities. As the African elephant has only recently been recognized to comprise two separate species, groups of captive elephants have not been comprehensively classified and some could well be hybrids.


Successful hybridisation between African and Asian Elephant species is much more unlikely, as is animal hybridization across different genera in general. In 1978, however, at Chester Zoo, an Asian elephant cow gave birth to a hybrid calf sired by an African elephant bull (the old terms are used here as these events pre-date the current classifications). "Motty", the resulting hybrid male calf, had an African elephant's cheeks, their ears (large with pointed lobes) and legs (longer and slimmer), but the toenail numbers, (5 for each front foot, 4 hind) and the single trunk finger of an Asian elephant. His wrinkled trunk was like that of an African elephant. His forehead was sloping with one dome and two smaller domes behind it. The body was African in type, but had an Asian-type centre hump and an African-type rear hump. The calf died of infection 12 days later. It is preserved as a mounte


frican in type, but had an Asian-type centre hump and an African-type rear hump. The calf died of infection 12 days later. It is preserved as a mounted specimen at the British Natural History Museum, London. There are unconfirmed rumours of three other hybrid elephants born in zoos or circuses; all are said to have been deformed and none survived.


Female African elephant with calf, in Kenya.


African bush (savanna) elephant in Mikumi National Park, Tanzania.


The Elephants of the genus Loxodonta, known collectively as African elephants, are currently found in 37 countries in Africa.


African elephants are distinguished from Asian elephants in several ways, the most noticeable being their ears. Africans' ears are much larger and are shaped like the continent of their origin. The African is typically larger than the Asian and has a concave back. Both African males and females have external tusks and are usually less hairy than their Asian cousins.


African elephants have traditionally been classified as a single species comprising two distinct subspecies, namely the savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana africana) and the forest elephant (Loxodonta africana cyclotis), but recent DNA analysis suggests that these may actually constitute distinct species.


While this split is not universally accepted by experts    a third species of African elephant has also been proposed.


Under the new two species classification, Loxodonta africana refers specifically to the Savanna Elephant, the largest of all elephants. In fact, it is the largest land animal in the world, standing up to 4 m (13 ft) at the shoulder and weighing approximately 7,000 kg (7.7 tons). The average male stands about 3 m (10 ft) tall at the shoulder and weighs about 5500â6000 kg (6.1â6.6 tons), the female being much smaller. Most often, Savanna Elephants are found in open grasslands, marshes, and lakeshores. They range over much of the savanna zone south of the Sahara.


The other postulated species is the Forest Elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis). Compared with the Savanna Elephant, its ears are usually smaller and rounder, and its tusks thinner and straighter and not directed outwards as much. The Forest Elephant can weigh up to 4,500 kg (10,000 lb) and stand about 3 m (10 ft) tall. Much less is known about these animals than their savanna cousins because environmental and political obstacles make them difficult to study. Normally, they inhabit the dense African rain forests of central and western Africa, though occasionally they roam the edges of forests and so overlap the territories of the Savanna elephants and breed with them. In 1979, Iain Douglas-Hamilton estimated the continental population of African elephants at around 1.3 million animals.    This estimate is controversial and is believed to be a gross overestimate ,    but it is very widely cited


lephants at around 1.3 million animals.    This estimate is controversial and is believed to be a gross overestimate ,    but it is very widely cited and has become a de facto baseline that continues to be incorrectly used to quantify downward population trends in the species. Through the 1980s, Loxodonta received worldwide attention due to the dwindling numbers of major populations in East Africa, largely as a result of poaching. Today, according to IUCNâs African Elephant Status Report 2007


there are approximately between 470,000 and 690,000 African elephants in the wild. Although this estimate only covers about half of the total elephant range, experts do not believe the true figure to be much higher, as it is unlikely that large populations remain to be discovered.    By far the largest populations are now found in Southern and Eastern Africa, which together account for the majority of the continental population. According to a recent analysis by IUCN experts, most major populations in Eastern and Southern Africa are stable or have been steadily increasing since the mid-1990s, at an average rate of 4.5% per annum.    Blanc et al. 2007, op. cit.


Elephant populations in West Africa, on the other hand, are generally small and fragmented, and only account for a small proportion of the continental total.


Much uncertainty remains as to the size of the elephant population in Central Africa, where the prevalence of forest makes population surveys difficult, but poaching for ivory and bushmeat is believed to be intense through much of the region.


An Asian elephant swimming.


The Asian elephant is smaller than the African. It has smaller ears, and typically, only the males have large external tusks.


O Elephante - Hand-coloured engraving drawn by H.Gobin and engraved by Ramus - Printed in France by the "Lamoureaux de Paris" and Published for MagalhÃ£es e Moniz Editores in Portugal - 1890 (From the Dr. Nuno Carvalho de Sousa Private Collections - Lisbon)


The world population of Asian elephants â also called Indian Elephants or Elephas maximus â is estimated to be around 60,000, about a tenth of the number of African elephants. More precisely, it is estimated that there are between 38,000 and 53,000 wild elephants and between 14,500 and 15,300 domesticated elephants in Asia with perhaps another 1,000 scattered around zoos in the rest of the world.    The Asian elephants' decline has possibly been more gradual with the causes primarily being poaching and habitat destruction by human encroachment.


There are several subspecies of Elephas maximus and some have been identified only using molecular markers. The first found subspecies is the Sri Lankan Elephant (Elephas maximus maximus). Found only on the island of Sri Lanka, it is the largest of the Asians. There are only an estimated 3,000â4,500 members of this subspecies left today in the wild, although no accurate census has been carried out in the recent past. Large males can weigh upward to 5,400 kg (12,000 lb) and stand over 3.4 m (11 ft) tall. Sri Lankan males have very large cranial bulges, and both sexes have more areas of depigmentation than are found in the other Asians. Typically, their ears, face, trunk, and belly have large concentrations of pink-speckled skin. There is an orphanage for elephants in Pinnawala Sri Lanka, which gives shelter to disabled, injured elephants. This program plays a large role in protecting th


n orphanage for elephants in Pinnawala Sri Lanka, which gives shelter to disabled, injured elephants. This program plays a large role in protecting the Sri Lankan Elephant from extinction.


Elephant In Sri Lanka


Another subspecies, the Indian Elephant  (Elephas maximus indicus) makes up the bulk of the Asian elephant population. Numbering approximately 36,000, these elephants are lighter grey in colour, with depigmentation only on the ears and trunk. Large males will ordinarily weigh only about 5,000 kg (11,000 lb) but are as tall as the Sri Lankan. The mainland Asian can be found in 11 Asian countries, from India to Indonesia. They prefer forested areas and transitional zones, between forests and grasslands, where greater food variety is available.


The smallest of all the elephants is the Sumatran Elephant (Elephas maximus sumatranus). Population estimates for this group range from 2,100 to 3,000 individuals. It is very light grey and has less depigmentation than the other Asians, with pink spots only on the ears. Mature Sumatrans will usually only measure 1.7â2.6 m (5.6â8.5 ft) at the shoulder and weigh less than 3,000 kg (6,600 lb). An enormous animal nonetheless, it is considerably smaller than its other Asian (and African) cousins and exists only on the island of Sumatra, usually in forested regions and partially wooded habitats.


In 2003 a further subspecies was identified on Borneo. Named the Borneo pygmy elephant, it is smaller and tamer than other Asian elephants. It also has relatively larger ears, longer tail and straighter tusks.


The proboscis, or trunk, is a fusion of the nose and upper lip, elongated and specialized to become the elephant's most important and versatile appendage. African elephants are equipped with two fingerlike projections at the tip of their trunk, while Asians have only one. According to biologists, the elephant's trunk may have over forty thousand individual muscles in it,    making it sensitive enough to pick up a single blade of grass, yet strong enough to rip the branches off a tree. Some sources indicate that the correct number of muscles in an elephant's trunk is closer to one hundred thousand.


Most herbivores (plant eaters, like the elephant) possess teeth adapted for cutting and tearing off plant materials. However, except for the very young or infirm, elephants always use their trunks to tear up their food and then place it in their mouth. They will graze on grass or reach up into trees to grasp leaves, fruit, or entire branches. If the desired food item is too high up, the elephant will wrap its trunk around the tree or branch and shake its food loose or sometimes simply knock the tree down altogether.


The trunk is also used for drinking. Elephants suck water up into the trunk (up to fifteen quarts or fourteen litres at a time) and then blow it into their mouth. Elephants also inhale water to spray on their body during bathing. On top of this watery coating, the animal will then spray dirt and mud, which act as a protective sunscreen. When swimming, the trunk makes an excellent snorkel.


This appendage also plays a key role in many social interactions. Familiar elephants will greet each other by entwining their trunks, much like a handshake. They also use them while play-wrestling, caressing during courtship and mother / child interactions, and for dominance displays â a raised trunk can be a warning or threat, while a lowered trunk can be a sign of submission. Elephants can defend themselves very well by flailing their trunk at unwanted intruders or by grasping and flinging them.


An elephant can use its trunk for a variety of purposes. This one is wiping its eye.


An elephant also relies on its trunk for its highly developed sense of smell. Raising the trunk up in the air and swivelling it from side to side, like a periscope, it can determine the location of friends, enemies, and food sources.


The tusks of an elephant are its second upper incisors. Tusks grow continuously; an adult male's tusks will grow about 18 cm (7 in) a year. Tusks are used to dig for water, salt, and roots; to debark trees, to eat the bark; to dig into baobab trees to get at the pulp inside; and to move trees and branches when clearing a path. In addition, they are used for marking trees to establish territory and occasionally as weapons.


Like humans who are typically right- or left-handed, elephants are usually right- or left-tusked. The dominant tusk, called the master tusk, is generally shorter and more rounded at the tip from wear. Both male and female African elephants have large tusks that can reach over 3 m (10 ft) in length and weigh over 90 kg (200 lb). In the Asian species, only the males have large tusks. Female Asians have tusks which are very small or absent altogether. Asian males can have tusks as long as the much larger Africans, but they are usually much slimmer and lighter; the heaviest recorded is 39 kg (86 lb). The tusk of both species is mostly made of calcium phosphate in the form of apatite. As a piece of living tissue, it is relatively soft (compared with other minerals such as rock), and the tusk, also known as ivory, is strongly favoured by artists for its carvability. The desire for elephant ivo


with other minerals such as rock), and the tusk, also known as ivory, is strongly favoured by artists for its carvability. The desire for elephant ivory has been one of the major factors in the reduction of the world's elephant population.


Some extinct relatives of elephants had tusks in their lower jaws in addition to their upper jaws, such as Gomphotherium, or only in their lower jaws, such as Deinotherium.


Elephants' teeth are very different from those of most other mammals. Over their lives they usually have 28 teeth. These are:


*The two upper second incisors: these are the tusks.


*The milk precursors of the tusks.


*12 premolars, 3 in each side of each jaw.


*12 molars, 3 in each side of each jaw.


Replica of an Asian Elephant's molar, showing upper side


This gives elephants a dental formula of:


Unlike most mammals, which grow baby teeth and then replace them with a permanent set of adult teeth, elephants have cycles of tooth rotation throughout their entire life. After one year the tusks are permanent, but the molars are replaced six times in an average elephant's lifetime.    The teeth do not emerge from the jaws vertically like with human teeth. Instead, they have a horizontal progression, like a conveyor belt. New teeth grow in at the back of the mouth, pushing older teeth toward the front, where they wear down with use and the remains fall out. When an elephant becomes very old, the last set of teeth is worn to stumps, and it must rely on softer foods to chew. Very elderly elephants often spend their last years exclusively in marshy areas where they can feed on soft wet grasses. Eventually, when the last teeth fall out, the elephant will be unable to eat and will die of sta


marshy areas where they can feed on soft wet grasses. Eventually, when the last teeth fall out, the elephant will be unable to eat and will die of starvation. Were it not for tooth wearout, their metabolism would allow them to live much longer. Rupert Sheldrake has proposed  this as an explanation for the elephant graveyards. However, as more habitat is destroyed, the elephants' living space becomes smaller and smaller; the elderly no longer have the opportunity to roam in search of more appropriate food and will, consequently, die of starvation at an earlier age.


Tusks in the lower jaw are also second incisors. These grew out large in Deinotherium and some mastodons, but in modern elephants they disappear early without erupting.


Skin of an African elephant


Elephants are called pachyderms, which means thick-skinned animals. An elephant's skin is extremely tough around most parts of its body and measures about 2.5 centimetres (1 in) thick. However, the skin around the mouth and inside of the ear is paper thin. Normally, the skin of an Asian is covered with more hair than its African counterpart. This is most noticeable in the young. Asian calves are usually covered with a thick coat of brownish red fuzz. As they get older, this hair darkens and becomes more sparse, but it will always remain on their heads and tails.


The species of elephants are typically greyish in colour, but the Africans very often appear brown or reddish from wallowing in mud holes of coloured soil. Wallowing is an important behaviour in elephant society. Not only is it important for socialization, but the mud acts as a sunscreen, protecting their skin from harsh ultraviolet radiation. Though tough, an elephant's skin is very sensitive. Without regular mud baths to protect it from burning, as well as from insect bites and moisture loss, an elephant's skin would suffer serious damage. After bathing, the elephant will usually use its trunk to blow dirt on its body to help dry and bake on its new protective coat. As elephants are limited to smaller and smaller areas, there is less water available, and local herds will often come too close over the right to use these limited resources.


r available, and local herds will often come too close over the right to use these limited resources.


Wallowing also aids the skin in regulating body temperatures. Elephants have difficulty in releasing heat through the skin because, in proportion to their body size, they have very little of it. The ratio of an elephant's mass to the surface area of its skin is many times that of a human. Elephants have even been observed lifting up their legs to expose the soles of their feet, presumably in an effort to expose more skin to the air. Since wild elephants live in very hot climates, they must have other means of getting rid of excess heat.


Elephant using its feet to crush a watermelon prior to eating it


An elephant's legs are great straight pillars, as they must be to support its bulk. The elephant needs less muscular power to stand because of its straight legs and large pad-like feet. For this reason an elephant can stand for very long periods of time without tiring. In fact, African elephants rarely lie down unless they are sick or wounded. Indian elephants, in contrast, lie down frequently.


The feet of an elephant are nearly round. African elephants have three nails on each hind foot, and four on each front foot. Indian elephants have four nails on each hind foot and five on each front foot. Beneath the bones of the foot is a tough, gelatinous material that acts as a cushion or shock absorber. Under the elephant's weight the foot swells, but it gets smaller when the weight is removed. An elephant can sink deep into mud, but can pull its legs out readily  because its feet become smaller when they are lifted.


An elephant is a good swimmer, but it can neither trot, jump, nor gallop. It does have two gaits: a walk, and a faster gait that is similar to running. In walking the legs act as pendulums, with the hips and shoulders rising and falling while the foot is planted on the ground. With no "aerial phase," the faster gait does not meet all the criteria of running, as elephants always have at least one foot on the ground. However an elephant moving fast uses its legs like a running animal does, with the hips and shoulders falling and then rising while the feet are on the ground. In this gait an elephant will have three feet off the ground at one time. As both of the hind feet and both of the front feet are off the ground at the same time, this gait has been likened to the hind legs and the front legs taking turns running. Moore, Tom. (May 2007). "Biomechanics: A Spring in Its Step". Natural His


t has been likened to the hind legs and the front legs taking turns running. Moore, Tom. (May 2007). "Biomechanics: A Spring in Its Step". Natural History 116:(4) 28-9.  Although they start this "run" at only 8 km/h,    elephants may reach 25 km/h, all the while using the same gait. At this speed most other four-legged creatures are well into a gallop, even with leg length accounted for. Spring-like kinetics may explain the difference between the motion of these and other animals.


Walking at a normal pace an elephant covers about 3 to 6 km/h (2 to 4 mph) but they can reach 40 km/h (24 mph) at full speed.


An Elephant sanctuary at Punnathur kotta, Kerala, south India.


The large flapping ears of an elephant are also very important for temperature regulation. Elephant ears are made of a very thin layer of skin stretched over cartilage and a rich network of blood vessels. On hot days, elephants will flap their ears constantly, creating a slight breeze. This breeze cools the surface blood vessels, and then the cooler blood gets circulated to the rest of the animal's body. The hot blood entering the ears can be cooled as much as ten degrees Fahrenheit before returning to the body. Differences in the ear sizes of African and Asian elephants can be explained, in part, by their geographical distribution. Africans originated and stayed near the equator, where it is warmer. Therefore, they have bigger ears. Asians live farther north, in slightly cooler climates, and thus have smaller ears.


live farther north, in slightly cooler climates, and thus have smaller ears.


The ears are also used in certain displays of aggression and during the males' mating period. If an elephant wants to intimidate a predator or rival, it will spread its ears out wide to make itself look more massive and imposing. During the breeding season, males give off an odour from a gland located behind their eyes. Joyce Poole, a well-known elephant researcher, has theorized that the males will fan their ears in an effort to help propel this "elephant cologne" great distances.


Evolution of elephants from the ancient Eocene (bottom) to the modern day (top).


Although the fossil evidence is uncertain, scientists discovered genetic evidence that the elephant family shares distant ancestry with the Sirenians (sea cows) and the hyraxes through gene comparisons. In the distant past, members of the hyrax family grew to large sizes, and it seems likely that the common ancestor of all three modern families was some kind of amphibious hyracoid. One theory suggests that these animals spent most of their time under water, using their trunks like snorkels for breathing. Modern elephants have retained this ability and are known to swim in that manner for up to 6 hours and 50 km.


In the past, there was a much wider variety of elephant genera, including the mammoths, stegodons and deinotheria. There was also a much wider variety of species. Todd, N. E. (2001).  African Elephas recki: time, space and taxonomy (pdf). In: Cavarretta, G., P. Gioia, M. Mussi, and M. R. Palombo. The World of Elephants, Proceedings of the 1st International Congress. Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche. Rome, Italy.  Todd, N. E. (2005). Reanalysis of African Elephas recki: implications for time, space and taxonomy. Quaternary International 126-128:65-72.


Elephants are herbivores, spending 16 hours a day collecting plant food. Their diet is at least 50% grasses, supplemented with leaves, bamboo, twigs, bark, roots, and small amounts of fruits, seeds and flowers. Because elephants only digest 40% of what they eat, they have to make up for their digestive system's lack of efficiency in volume. An adult elephant can consume 140â270 kg (300â600 lb) of food a day. 60% of that food leaves the elephant's body undigested.


Human, dolphin and elephant brains up to scale. (1)-cerebrum (1a)-temporal lobe and (2)-cerebellum


With a mass just over 5 kg (11 lb), elephant brains are larger than those of any land animal, and although the largest whales have body masses twentyfold those of a typical elephant, whale brains are barely twice the mass of an elephant's. A wide variety of behaviour, including those associated with grief, making music, art, altruism, allomothering, play, use of tools,     compassion and self-awareness      evidence a highly intelligent species on par with cetaceans    and primates   .


The largest areas in elephant brain are those responsible for hearing, smell and movement coordination, and a large portion of the brain has to do with trunk management and sensitivity.


Elephants have well innervated trunks, and an exceptional sense of hearing and smell. The hearing receptors reside not only in ears, but also in trunks that are sensitive to vibrations, and most significantly feet, which have special receptors for low frequency sound and are exceptionally well innervated. It is believed that sound communication between elephants on large distances, through the ground, is important in their social lives, and elephants are observed listening by putting trunks on the ground and carefully moving their very sensitive feet.


Elephant footprints (tire tracks for scale)Elephants live in a structured social order. The social lives of male and female elephants are very different. The females spend their entire lives in tightly knit family groups made up of mothers, daughters, sisters, and aunts. These groups are led by the eldest female, or matriarch. Adult males, on the other hand, live mostly solitary lives.


The social circle of the female elephant does not end with the small family unit. In addition to encountering the local males that live on the fringes of one or more groups, the female's life also involves interaction with other families, clans, and subpopulations. Most immediate family groups range from five to fifteen adults, as well as a number of immature males and females. When a group gets too big, a few of the elder daughters will break off and form their own small group. They remain very aware of which local herds are relatives and which are not.


The life of the adult male is very different. As he gets older, he begins to spend more time at the edge of the herd, gradually going off on his own for hours or days at a time. Eventually, days become weeks, and somewhere around the age of fourteen, the mature male, or bull, sets out from his natal group for good. While males do live primarily solitary lives, they will occasionally form loose associations with other males. These groups are called bachelor herds. The males spend much more time than the females fighting for dominance with each other. Only the most dominant males will be permitted to breed with cycling females. The less dominant ones must wait their turn. It is usually the older bulls, forty to fifty years old, that do most of the breeding.


f the breeding.


The dominance battles between males can look very fierce, but typically they inflict very little injury. Most of the bouts are in the form of aggressive displays and bluffs. Ordinarily, the smaller, younger, and less confident animal will back off before any real damage can be done. However, during the breeding season, the battles can get extremely aggressive, and the occasional elephant is injured. During this season, known as musth, a bull will fight with almost any other male it encounters, and it will spend most of its time hovering around the female herds, trying to find a receptive mate.


Mirror self recognition is a test of self awareness and cognition used in animal studies. A mirror was provided and visible marks were made on the elephant. The elephants investigated these marks, that were visible only via the mirror. The tests also included non-visible marks to rule out the possibility of their using other senses to detect these marks. This shows that elephants recognize the fact that the image in the mirror is their own self and such abilities are considered the basis for empathy, altruism and higher social interactions. This ability had earlier only been demonstrated in humans, apes and Bottlenose Dolphins. Joshua M. Plotnik, Frans B. M. de Waal, and Diana Reiss (2006) Self-recognition in an Asian elephant. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 103(45):17053â17057 10.1073/pnas.0608062103  abstract A young elephant in Zimbabwe.


of the National Academy of Sciences 103(45):17053â17057 10.1073/pnas.0608062103  abstract A young elephant in Zimbabwe.


African as well as Asiatic males will engage in same-sex bonding and mounting. Such encounters are often associated with affectionate interactions, such as kissing, trunk intertwining, and placing trunks in each other's mouths. The encounters are analogous to heterosexual bouts, one male often extending his trunk along the other's back and pushing forward with his tusks to signify his intention to mount. Unlike heterosexual relations, which are always of a fleeting nature, those between males result in a "companionship", consisting of an older individual and one or two younger, attendant males. Same-sex relations are common and frequent in both sexes, with Asiatic elephants in captivity devoting roughly 45% of sexual encounters to same-sex activity. Bruce Bagemihl, Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity, St. Martin's Press, 1999; pp.427-430


activity. Bruce Bagemihl, Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity, St. Martin's Press, 1999; pp.427-430


Elephants communicate over long distances by producing and receiving low-frequency sound (infrasound), a sub-sonic rumbling, which can travel through the ground farther than sound travels through the air. This can be felt by the sensitive skin of an elephant's feet and trunk, which pick up the resonant vibrations much as the flat skin on the head of a drum. To listen attentively, every member of the herd will lift one foreleg from the ground, and face the source of the sound, or often lay its trunk on the ground. The lifting presumably increases the ground contact and sensitivity of the remaining legs. This ability is thought also to aid their navigation by use of external sources of infrasound. Discovery of this new aspect of elephant social communication and perception came with breakthroughs in audio technology, which can pick up frequencies outside the range of the human ear. Pioneer


al communication and perception came with breakthroughs in audio technology, which can pick up frequencies outside the range of the human ear. Pioneering research in elephant infrasound communication was done by Katy Payne, of the Elephant Listening Project,    and is detailed in her book Silent Thunder. Though this research is still in its infancy, it is helping to solve many mysteries, such as how elephants can find distant potential mates, and how social groups are able to coordinate their movements over extensive range.


Females (cows) reach sexual maturity at around 9â12 years of age and become pregnant for the first time, on average, around age 13. They can reproduce until ages 55â60. Females give birth at intervals of about 5 years. Their gestation (pregnancy) period lasts about 22 months (630â660 days), the longest gestation period of any mammal, after which typically one calf is born. Twins are rare. Labour ranges in length from 5 minutes to 60 hours. The average length of labour is 11 hours. At birth, calves weigh around 90â115 kg (200â250 lb), and they gain 1 kg (2â2.5 lb) a day. In the wild, the mother is accompanied by other adult females (aunts), who protect the young, and baby elephants are raised and nurtured by the whole family group, practically from the moment of birth.


p, practically from the moment of birth.


African elephant calf nursing


The first sound a newborn calf usually makes is a sneezing or snorting sound to clear its nasal passages of fluids In the first few minutes after a captive birth, the keepers must monitor the calf closely for the first sound or movement. Whichever happens first, the mother typically responds to her new baby with surprise and excitement. With the help of its mother, a newborn calf usually struggles to its feet within 30 minutes of birth. For support, it will often lean against its mother's legs. A newborn calf usually stands within one hour and is strong enough to follow its mother in a slowly moving herd within a few days.


Unlike most mammals, female elephants have a single pair of mammary glands located just behind the front legs. When born, a calf is about 90 centimeters (3 feet) high, just tall enough to reach its mother's nipples. A calf suckles with its mouth, not its trunk, which has no muscle tone. To clear the way to its mouth so it can suckle, the calf will flop its trunk onto its forehead. A newborn calf suckles for only a few minutes at a time but many times per day, consuming up to 11 litres (3 U.S. gallons) of milk in a single day. A calf may nurse for up to 2 years or more. Complete weaning depends on the disposition of the mother, the amount of available milk, and the arrival of another calf.


Newborn calves learn mainly by observing adults, not from instinct. For example, a calf learns how to use its trunk by watching older elephants using their trunks. It takes several months for a calf to control the use of its trunk. This can be observed as the calf trips over its trunk or as the trunk wiggles like a rubbery object when the calf shakes its head.


Elephant social life revolves around breeding and raising of the calves. A female will usually be ready to breed around the age of thirteen, at which time she will seek out the most attractive male to mate with.  Females are generally attracted to bigger, stronger, and, most importantly, older males. Such a reproductive strategy tends to increase their offspring's chances of survival.


After a twenty-two-month pregnancy, the mother will give birth to a calf that will weigh about 113 kg (250 lb) and stand over 76 cm (2.5 ft) tall. Elephants have a very long childhood. They are born with fewer survival instincts than many other animals. Instead, they must rely on their elders to teach them the things they need to know. Today, however, the pressures humans have put on the wild elephant populations, from poaching to habitat destruction, mean that the elderly often die at a younger age, leaving fewer teachers for the young.


All members of the tightly knit female group participate in the care and protection of the young. Since everyone in the herd is related, there is never a shortage of baby-sitters. In fact, a new calf is usually the centre of attention for all herd members. All the adults and most of the other young will gather around the newborn, touching and caressing it with their trunks. The baby is born nearly blind and at first relies, almost completely, on its trunk to discover the world around it.


After the initial excitement, the mother will usually select several full-time baby-sitters, or "allomothers", from her group. According to Cynthia Moss, a well known researcher, these allomothers will help in all aspects of raising the calf.  They walk with the young as the herd travels, helping the calves along if they fall or get stuck in the mud. The more allomothers a baby has, the more free time its mother has to feed herself. Providing a calf with nutritious milk means the mother has to eat more nutritious food herself. So, the more allomothers, the better the calf's chances of survival. An elephant is considered an allomother when she is not able to have her own baby. A benefit of being an allomother is that she can gain experience or receive assistance when caring for her own calf.


or receive assistance when caring for her own calf.


Elephants' foraging activities affect the areas in which they live:


*By pulling down trees to eat leaves, breaking branches, and pulling out roots they create clearings in which new young trees and other vegetation grow to provide future nutrition for elephants and other organisms.


*Elephants make pathways through the environment that are used by other animals to access areas normally out of reach. The pathways have been used by several generations of elephants, and today people are converting many of them to paved roads.


*During the dry season elephants use their tusks to dig into dry river beds to reach underground sources of water. These newly dug water holes may become the only source of water in the area.


*Elephants are a species which many other organisms depend on. For example, termites eat elephant feces and often begin building termite mounds under piles of elephant feces.


The threat to the African elephant presented by the ivory trade is unique to the species. Larger, long-lived, slow-breeding animals, like the elephant, are more susceptible to overhunting than other animals. They cannot hide, and it takes many years for an elephant to grow and reproduce. An elephant needs an average of 140 kg (300 lb) of vegetation a day to survive. As large predators are hunted, the local small grazer populations (the elephant's food competitors) find themselves on the rise. The increased number of herbivores ravage the local trees, shrubs, and grasses.  Elephants themselves have few natural predators besides man and, occasionally, lions.


Another threat to elephant's survival in general is the ongoing cultivation of their habitats with increasing risk of conflicts of interest with human cohabitants. These conflicts kill 150 elephants and up to 100 people per year in Sri Lanka.    Lacking the massive tusks of its African cousins, the Asian elephant's demise can be attributed mostly to loss of its habitat.


As larger patches of forest disappear, the ecosystem is affected in profound ways. The trees are responsible for anchoring soil and absorbing water runoff. Floods and massive erosion are common results of deforestation. Elephants need massive tracts of land because, much like the slash-and-burn farmers, they are used to crashing through the forest, tearing down trees and shrubs for food and then cycling back later on, when the area has regrown. As forests are reduced to small pockets, elephants become part of the problem, quickly destroying all the vegetation in an area, eliminating all their resources.


An Elephant resting his head on a tree trunk, Samburu National Reserve, Kenya.


An elephant in the Ngorongoro crater, Tanzania.


Africa's first official reserve eventually became one of the world's most famous and successful national parks. Kruger National Park in South Africa first became a reserve against great opposition in 1898 (then Sabi Reserve). It was deproclaimed and reproclaimed several times before it was renamed and granted national park status in 1926. It was to be the first of many.


There were many problems in establishing these reserves. For example, elephants range through a wide tract of land with little regard for national borders. However, when most parks were created, the boundaries were drawn at the human-made borders of individual countries. Once a fence was erected, many animals found themselves cut off from their winter feeding grounds or spring breeding areas. Some animals died as a result, while some, like the elephants, just trampled through the fences. This did little to belie their image as a crop-raiding pest. The more often an elephant wandered off its reserve, the more trouble it got into, and the more chance it had of being shot by an angry farmer. When confined to small territories, elephants can inflict an enormous amount of damage to the local landscapes. Today there are still many problems associated with these parks and reserves, but there is


flict an enormous amount of damage to the local landscapes. Today there are still many problems associated with these parks and reserves, but there is now little question as to whether or not they are necessary. As scientists learn more about nature and the environment, it becomes very clear that these parks may be the elephant's last hope against the rapidly changing world around them.


Additionally, Kruger National Park has suffered from elephant overcrowding, at the expense of other species of wildlife within the reserve. South Africa slaughtered 14,562 elephants in the reserve between 1967 and 1994; it stopped in 1995, mostly due to international and local pressure. Without action, it is predicted that the elephant population in Kruger National Park will triple to 34,000 by 2020.


The harvest of elephants, both legal and illegal, has had some unexpected consequences on elephant anatomy as well. African ivory hunters, by killing only tusked elephants, have given a much larger chance of mating to elephants with small tusks or no tusks at all. The propagation of the absent-tusk gene has resulted in the birth of large numbers of tuskless elephants, now approaching 30% in some populations (compare with a rate of about 1% in 1930). Tusklessness, once a very rare genetic abnormality, has become a widespread hereditary trait.


It is possible, if unlikely, that continued selection pressure could bring about a complete absence of tusks in African elephants, a development normally requiring thousands of years of evolution. The effect of tuskless elephants on the environment, and on the elephants themselves, could be dramatic. Elephants use their tusks to root around in the ground for necessary minerals, tear apart vegetation, and spar with one another for mating rights. Without tusks, elephant behaviour could change dramatically.


African Savanna Elephant Loxodonta africana, born 1969 (left), and Asian Elephant Elephas maximus, born 1970 (right), at an English zoo.


Elephants have been working animals used in various capacities by humans. Seals found in the Indus Valley suggest that the elephant was first domesticated in ancient India. However, elephants have never been truly domesticated: the male elephant in his periodic condition of musth is dangerous and difficult to control. Therefore elephants used by humans have typically been female, war elephants being an exception, however: as female elephants in battle will run from a male, only males could be used in war. It is generally more economical to capture wild young elephants and tame them than breeding them in captivity (see also elephant "crushing").


War elephants were used by armies in the Indian sub-continent, and later by the Persian empire. This use was adopted by Hellenistic armies after Alexander the Great experienced their worth against king Porus, notably in the Ptolemaic and Seleucid diadoch empires. The Carthaginian general Hannibal took elephants across the Alps when he was fighting the Romans, but brought too few elephants to be of much military use, although his horse cavalry was quite successful; he probably used a now-extinct third African (sub)species, the North African (Forest) elephant, smaller than its two southern cousins, and presumably easier to domesticate. A large elephant in full charge could cause tremendous damage to infantry, and cavalry horses would be afraid of them (see Battle of Hydaspes).


d of them (see Battle of Hydaspes).


Throughout Siam, India, and most of South Asia elephants were used in the military for heavy labour, especially for uprooting trees and moving logs, and were also commonly used as executioners to crush the condemned underfoot.


The Judean rebel Eleazar Maccabeus kills a Seleucid war elephant and is crushed under it (Miniature from a manuscript ''Speculum Humanae Salvationis).


Elephants have also been used as mounts for safari-type hunting, especially Indian shikar (mainly on tigers), and as ceremonial mounts for royal and religious occasions, whilst Asian elephants have been used for transport and entertainment, and are common to circuses around the world.


African elephants have long been reputed to not be domesticable, but some entrepreneurs have succeeded by bringing Asian mahouts from Sri Lanka to Africa. In Botswana, Uttum Corea has been working with African elephants and has several young tame elephants near Gaborone. African elephants are more temperamental than Asian elephants, but are easier to train. Because of their more sensitive temperaments, they require different training methods than Asian elephants and must be trained from infancy hence Corea worked with orphaned elephants. African elephants are now being used for (photo) safaris. Corea's elephants are also used to entertain tourists and haul logs.


Elephants are also commonly exhibited in zoos and wild animal parks.


There is growing resistance    against the capture, confinement, and use of wild elephants. Animal rights advocates allege that elephants in zoos "suffer a life of chronic physical ailments, social deprivation, emotional starvation, and premature death".    However, zoos argue that standards for treatment of elephants are extremely high and that minimum requirements for such things as minimum space requirements, enclosure design, nutrition, reproduction, enrichment and veterinary care are set to ensure the wellbeing of elephants in captivity.


The founder of the Indo-Greek Kingdom in Bactria, Demetrius I (205-171 BC), wearing the scalp of an elephant, symbol of his conquest of India .


Elephants on the embossed cover of Kipling's original 1894 edition of The Jungle Book,  based on art by John Lockwood Kipling (Rudyard's father)


*George Orwell wrote a famous essay entitled "Shooting an Elephant", chronicling a 1926 episode of being forced to shoot an elephant while he served as an Imperial Policeman in Burma.


* The phrase 'elephants never forget' has no metaphorical meaning, it refers literally to elephants supposedly having an excellent memory.


* The expression white elephant refers to an expensive burden, particularly to a situation in which much has been invested with false expectations. The phrase 'white elephant sale' was sometimes used in Australia as a synonym for jumble sale.


* Jumbo, a circus elephant, has entered the English language as a synonym for "large".


* Dumbo, the elephant who learns to fly in the Disney movie of the same name.


*The French children's storybook character Babar the Elephant (an elephant king) created by Jean de Brunhoff and also an animated TV series.


*The Oakland Athletics mascot is a white elephant. The story of picking the mascot was started when New York Giants' manager John McGraw told reporters that Philadelphia manufacturer Benjamin Shibe, who owned the controlling interest in the new team, had a âwhite elephant on his hands," Connie Mack defiantly adopted the white elephant as the team mascot, though over the years the elephant has appeared in several different colours (currently forest green). The Aâs are sometimes, though infrequently, referred to as the Elephants or White Elephants. The team mascot is nicknamed Stomper.


* The Elephant's Child is one of Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories.


* Horton Hatches the Egg is a book by Dr. Seuss about a faithful elephant who sits on the nest of an irresponsible bird for months.


*Joseph Merrick, a British man in Victorian England was nicknamed "The Elephant Man" due to the nature and extent of his deformities.


* American band the White Stripes' fourth album was entitled Elephant, possibly because of lead singer Jack White's fondness of the animals' extreme sensitivity toward each other. The album was #390 in Rolling Stone magazine's "500 Best Albums of All Time".


* The Thai movie Tom-Yum-Goong (US title: "The Protector", UK title: "Warrior King") is about a man named Kham who travels from Thailand to Australia in pursuit of poachers who have stolen two elephants. Kham is a member of a family that protects the elephants of the King of Thailand. The movie was directed by Prachya Pinkaew and stars Tony Jaa.


* In J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings story, there exist oliphaunts, house-sized versions of elephants.


Esala Perahera in Kandy, Sri Lanka.


An elephant carrying Thidambu during Thrissur Pooram festival in Kerala, south India.


* The scattered skulls of prehistoric pygmy elephants on Crete, featuring a single large nasal cavity at the front, may have formed the basis of belief in existence of cyclops, the one-eyed giants featured in Homer's Odyssey.


* A white elephant is considered holy in Thailand.


* Ganesh, the Hindu god of wisdom, has an elephant's head.


* Elephants are used in festivals in Sri Lanka, such as the Esala Perahera.


* The story of the Blind Men and an Elephant was written to show how reality may be viewed by different perspectives. Its source is unknown, but it appears to have originated in India. It has been attributed to Buddhists, Hindus, Jainists, and Sufis, and was also used by Discordians.


* In Judeo-Christian accounts, including Midrash on the sixth chapter of the apocryphal book of 1 Maccabees, the youngest of the Hasmonean brothers, Eleazar the Maccabee stuck a spear under the foot of an elephant carrying an important Greek-Assyrian general, killing the elephant, the general, and Eleazar.


A newspaper clip shows election officials carrying the EVM (Electronic Voting Machine) on an elephant. These officials are travelling to a remote polling station, inaccessible by other means of transport.


*After Alexander's victory over the Indian king Porus, the captured war elephants became a symbol of imperial power, used as an emblem of the Seleucid diadoch empire, e.g. on coins.


*The elephant, and the white elephant (also a religious symbol of Buddha) in particular, has often been used as a symbol of royal power and prestige in Asia; occurring on the flag of the kingdom Laos (three visible, supporting an umbrella, another symbol of royal power) till it became a republic in 1975, and other Indochinese and Thai realms had also displayed one or more white elephants.


*The elephant is also the symbol for the Republican Party of the United States, originating in an 1874 cartoon of an Asian elephant by Thomas Nast of Harper's Weekly (Nast also originated the donkey as the symbol of the Democratic Party).


* The Order of the Elephant ( ) is the highest order of Denmark, instituted in its current form on 1693 by King Christian V. The collar of the order consists of alternating elephants and towers, and its badge shows an  elephant bearing a watch tower, in front of which a Moor is sitting, holding a golden spear.


Elephants are among the world's most potentially dangerous animals, capable of crushing and killing any other land animal, from humans to lions and even rhinoceros. They can experience unexpected bouts of rage, and can be vindictive.    In Africa, groups of young teenage elephants attack human villages in what is thought to be revenge for the destruction of their society by massive cullings done in the 1970s and 80s.    In India, male elephants attack villages at night, destroying homes and killing people on a regular basis. In the Indian state of Jharkhand, 300 people were killed by elephants between 2000 and 2004, and in Assam, 239 people have been killed by elephants since 2001.  In India alone there are up to 200 elephant-caused human deaths every year, and in Sri Lanka around 50 per year.


eaths every year, and in Sri Lanka around 50 per year.


Adult male elephants naturally enter the periodic state called musth (Hindi for madness), sometimes spelt "must" in English. It is characterised by very excited and/or aggressive behavior and a thick, tar-like liquid secretion that discharges through the temporal ducts from the temporal glands on the sides of the head.


Musth is linked to sexual arousal or establishing dominance, but this relationship is far from clear.  Numerous cases of elephant goring and killing of rhinoceroses in national parks in Africa have been documented and attributed to musth in young male elephants, especially those growing in the absence of older males.  Studies show that reintroducing older males into the population seem to have the effect of preventing younger males from entering musth, and therefore, stopping their aggressive behavior.   "Killing of black and white rhinoceroses by African elephants in Hluhluwe-Umfolozi Park, South Africa" by Rob Slotow, Dave Balfour, and Owen Howison. Pachyderm 31 (July-December, 2001):14-20. Accessed September 14, 2007.


A musth elephant, wild or domesticated, is extremely dangerous to humans. Domesticated elephants in India are traditionally tied to a tree and denied food and water for several days, after which the musth passes. In zoos, musth is often the cause of fatal accidents to elephant keepers. Zoos keeping adult male elephants need extremely secure enclosures, which greatly complicates the attempts to breed elephants in zoos.


Musth is accompanied by a significant rise in reproductive hormones. Testosterone levels in an elephant in musth can be as much as 60 times greater than in the same elephant at other times. However, whether this hormonal surge is the sole cause of musth, or merely a contributing factor is unknown: scientific investigation of musth is greatly hindered by the fact that even the most otherwise placid of elephants may actively try to kill any and all humans. Similarly, the tar-like secretion remains largely uncharacterised, due to the difficulties of collecting a sample for analysis.


Although it has often been speculated that musth is linked to rut, this is unlikely, because the female elephant's estrus cycle is not seasonally-linked. Furthermore, bulls in musth have often been known to attack female elephants, regardless of whether or not the females are in heat.


The Hindi word "musth" is from the Urdu mast, which in turn is from a Persian root meaning "intoxicated".


The Channel 5 British television program "The Dark Side of Elephants" (March 20 2006) stated that during musth:


* The swelling of the temporal glands presses on the elephant's eyes and causes the elephant severe pain comparable to severe root abscess toothache. One elephant behaviour that tries to counteract this is digging the tusks into the ground.


* The musth secretion, which naturally runs down into the elephant's mouth, is full of ketones and aldehydes and (to a human at least) tastes unbelievably foul.


* As a result, musth behaviour is at least partly due to the elephant being driven mad by pain and distress.


Steve Hirano tries to hold Tyke the elephant behind a gate during a rampage.


At least a few elephants have been suspected to be drunk during their attacks. In December 1998, a herd of elephants overran a village in India. Although locals reported that nearby elephants had recently been observed drinking beer which rendered them "unpredictable", officials considered it the least likely explanation for the attack.    An attack on another Indian village occurred in October 1999, and again locals believed the reason was drunkenness, but the theory was not widely accepted.    Purportedly drunk elephants raided yet another Indian village again on December 2002, killing six people, which led to killing of about 200 elephants by locals.    Elephants have used their powers of deduction to "hijack" trucks carrying sugarcane.


Rogue elephant is a term for a lone, violently aggressive wild elephant, separated from the rest of the herd. It is a calque of the Sinhala term hora aliya. Its introduction to English has been attributed by the Oxford English Dictionary to Sir James Emerson Tennent, but this usage may have been pre-dated by William Sirr.


In some parts of Africa lions prey on elephants. Lions are the only known natural predators of elephants.


Elephants have a variety of both ecto-parasites and endo-parasites, including the highly specialized flies of the genus Cobboldia.


1. The supposed African Pygmy Elephant (Loxodonta (africana) pumilio or Loxodonta fransseni) is indistinguishable from the normal African Forest Elephant on a population genetics level. It appears to be a local morph.  Status of the so-called African pygmy elephant (Loxodonta pumilio (NOACK 1906)) - Accessed December 16, 2007


2. The elephant population in Vietnam and Laos is undergoing tests to determine if it is a fifth subspecies.


3. The subfamily Lophodontinae/Rhynchotheriinae, are placed by some authors within the gomphotheres, while others consider them as true Elephantidae.


*  Temple Elephants in India â A short video in Quicktime format.


*  African Elephant Database â For current info on African elephant distribution and numbers.


*  Elephant Sanctuary, Howenwald, Tenn.


The Republic of Ghana is a country in West Africa. It borders CÃ´te d'Ivoire (also known as Ivory Coast) to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, Togo to the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the south. The word "Ghana" means "Warrior King", Jackson, John G. Introduction to African Civilizations, 2001. Page 201.  and was the source of the name "Guinea" (via French Guinoye) used to refer to the West African coast (as in Gulf of Guinea).


Ghana was inhabited in pre-colonial times by a number of ancient kingdoms, including the Ga Adangbes on the eastern coast, inland Empire of Ashanti and various Fante states along the coast and inland. Trade with European states flourished after contact with the Portuguese in the 15th century, and the British established a crown colony, Gold Coast, in 1874. MacLean, Iain. Rational Choice and British Politics: An Analysis of Rhetoric and Manipulation from Peel to Blair, 2001. Page 76.


Upon achieving independence from the United Kingdom in 1957, Peter N. Stearns and William Leonard Langer. The Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern, Chronologically Arranged, 2001. Page 1050.  the name Ghana was chosen for the new nation to reflect the ancient Empire of Ghana that once extended throughout much of western Africa.


Medieval Ghana (4th - 13th Century):The Republic of Ghana is named after the medieval Ghana Empire of West Africa. The actual name of the Empire was Wagadugu. Ghana was the title of the kings who ruled the kingdom. It was controlled by Sundiata in 1240 AD, and absorbed into the larger Mali Empire. (Mali Empire reached its peak of success under Mansa Musa around 1307.)


Geographically, the old Ghana is 500 miles north of the present Ghana, and occupied the area between Rivers Senegal and Niger.


Some inhabitants of present Ghana had ancestors linked with the medieval Ghana. This can be traced down to the Mande and Voltaic people of Northern Ghana--Mamprussi, Dagomba and the Gonja.


Anecdotal evidence connected the Akans to this Empire. The evidence lies in names like Danso shared by the Akans of present Ghana and Mandikas of Senegal/Gambia who have strong links with the Empire.


Ghana was also the site of the Empire of Ashanti which was the most advanced black state in sub-Sahara Africa. It is said that at its peak, the King of Ashanti could field 500,000 troops.


Gold Coast & European Exploration: Before March 1957 Ghana was called the Gold Coast. The Portuguese who came to Ghana in the 15th Century found so much gold between the rivers Ankobra and the Volta that they named the place Mina - meaning Mine. The Gold Coast was later adopted to by the English colonisers. Similarly, the French, equally impressed by the trinkets worn by the coastal people, named The Ivory Coast, Cote d'Ivoire.


In 1482, the Portuguese built the Elmina Castle. Their aim was to trade in gold, ivory and slaves. In 1481 King John II of Portugal sent Diogo d'Azambuja to build this castle.


In 1598 the Dutch joined them, and built forts at Komenda and Kormantsi. In 1637 they captured the castle from the Portuguese and that of Axim in 1642 (Fort St Anthony). Other European traders joined in by the mid 17th century. These were the English, Danes and Swedes. The coastline was dotted by more than 30 forts and castles built by the Dutch, British and the Danish merchants, the highest concentration of European military architecture outside of Europe. By the latter part of 19th century the Dutch and the British were the only traders left and when the Dutch withdrew in 1874, Britain made the Gold Coast a crown colony.


For most of central sub-Saharan Africa, agricultural expansion marked the period before 500. Farming began earliest on the southern tips of the Sahara, eventually giving rise to village settlements. Toward the end of the classical era, larger regional kingdoms were formed in West Africa, one of which was the Kingdom of Ghana, north of what is today the nation of Ghana. After its fall at the beginning of the 13th century, Akan migrants moved southward then founded several nation-states including the first great Akan empire of the Bono which is now known as the ibalBrong Ahafo region in Ghana. Later Akan groups such as the Ashanti federation and Fante states are thought to possibly have roots in the original Bono settlement at Bono manso. Much of the area was united under the Empire of Ashanti by the 16th century. The Ashanti government operated first as a loose network and eventually as a


h of the area was united under the Empire of Ashanti by the 16th century. The Ashanti government operated first as a loose network and eventually as a centralized kingdom with an advanced, highly-specialized bureaucracy centered in Kumasi.


The first contact between the Ghanaian peoples, the Fantes on the coastal area and Europeans occurred in 1482. The Portuguese  first landed at Elmina, a coastal city inhabited by the Fanti nation-state in 1482. During the next few centuries parts of the area were controlled by British, Portuguese, and Scandinavian powers, with the British ultimately prevailing. These nation-states maintained varying alliances with the colonial powers and each other, which resulted in the 1806 Ashanti-Fante War, as well as an ongoing struggle by the Empire of Ashanti against the British. Moves toward regional de-colonization began in 1946, and the area's first constitution was promulgated in 1951.


Formed from the merger of the British colony Gold Coast, The Empire of Ashanti and the British Togoland trust territory by a UN sponsored plebiscite, Ghana became the first democratic sub-Sahara country in colonial Africa to gain its independence in 1957. Kwame Nkrumah, founder and first president of the modern Ghanaian state, was not only an African anti-colonial leader but also one with a dream of a united Africa which would not drift into neo-colonialism. He was the first African head of state to espouse Pan-Africanism, an idea he came into contact with during his studies at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania (United States), at the time when Marcus Garvey was becoming famous for his "Back to Africa Movement." He merged the dreams of both Marcus Garvey and the celebrated African-American scholar W.E.B. Du Bois into the formation of the modern day Ghana. Ghana's principles of freedom a


h Marcus Garvey and the celebrated African-American scholar W.E.B. Du Bois into the formation of the modern day Ghana. Ghana's principles of freedom and justice, equity and free education for all, irrespective of ethnic background, religion or creed borrow from Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah's implementation of Pan-Africanism.


Nkrumah was overthrown by a supported CIA-backed coup Interview with John Stockwell in Pandora's Box: Black Power (Adam Curtis, BBC Two, 22 June 1992)        On Nkrumah assassination by CIA: Gaines, Kevin (2006) American Africans in Ghana, Black expatriates and the Civil Rights Era, The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill. . A series of subsequent coups ended with the ascension to power of Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings in 1981. These changes resulted in the suspension of the constitution in 1981 and the banning of political parties. A new constitution, restoring multi-party politics, was promulgated in 1992, and Rawlings was elected as president in the free and fair elections of that year and again won the elections 1996 to serve his second term. The constitution prohibited him from running for a third term. John Kufuor, the current president, is now serving his second ter


erve his second term. The constitution prohibited him from running for a third term. John Kufuor, the current president, is now serving his second term, which ends in 2008 where another election will be held to elect a new president. The year 2007 marks Ghana's Golden Jubilee celebration of its 50-year anniversary, which was on March 6th, 1957.


Ghana is a republic and member of the Commonwealth of Nations. Its head of state is President John Agyekum Kufuor, the ninth leader of the country since independence. The government sits at Osu Castle. The Parliament of Ghana is unicameral and dominated by two main parties, the New Patriotic Party and National Democratic Congress.


Well endowed with natural resources, Ghana has twice the per capita output of the poorer countries in West Africa. Even so, Ghana remains heavily dependent on international financial and technical assistance. Gold, timber, cocoa, diamond, bauxite, and manganese exports are major sources of foreign exchange.  The World Factbook   An oilfield which is reported to contain up to 3 billion barrels of light oil was discovered in 2007.


The domestic economy continues to revolve around subsistence agriculture, which accounts for 50% of GDP and employs 85% of the work force,  The World Factbook  mainly small landholders. Ghana made progress under a three-year structural adjustment programme in cooperation with the IMF.  On the negative side, public sector wage increases and regional peacekeeping commitments have led to continued inflationary deficit financing, depreciation of the Cedi, and rising public discontent with Ghana's austerity measures. Even so, Ghana remains one of the more economically sound countries in all of Africa.


The country has since July, 2007, embarked on a currency re-denomination exercise, from Cedi (Â¢) to the new currency, the Ghana Cedi (GHÂ¢). The transfer rate is 1 Ghana Cedi for every 10,000 Cedis. The Bank of Ghana has embarked upon an aggressive media campaign to educate the public about what re-denomination entails. The new Ghana Cedi is now exchanging at a rate of $1 USD =GhÂ¢ 0.93


Value Added Tax is a consumption tax administered in Ghana. The tax regime which started in 1998 had a single rate but since September 2007 entered into a multiple rate regime.


In 1998, the rate of tax was 10% and amended in 2000 to 21.5%. However with the passage of Act 734 of 2007, a 3% VAT Flat Rate Scheme (VFRS) begun to operate for the retail distribution sector. This allows retailers of taxable goods under Act 546 to charge a marginal 3% on their sales and account on same to the VAT Service. It is aimed at simplifying the tax system and increasing compliance. It is the hope of government that if properly monitored, it would ultimately increase tax revenue in the country.


Regions of Ghana


Ghana is a divided into 10 regions, subdivided into a total of 138 districts. The regions are:


Map of Ghana


Ghana is a country located on the Gulf of Guinea, only a few degrees north of the Equator, therefore giving it a warm climate. The Greenwich Meridian also passes through Ghana, specifically through the industrial city of Ghana-Tema; so it is said that Ghana is geographically closer to the "center" of the world than any other country. La Cote d'Ivoire is located to the west of Ghana while Burkina Faso and Togo are located to its north and east respectively. The coastline is mostly a low, sandy shore backed by plains and scrub and intersected by several rivers and streams. A tropical rain forest belt, broken by heavily forested hills and many streams and rivers, extends northward from the shore. North of this belt, the land is covered by low bush, park-like savannah, and grassy plains.


bush, park-like savannah, and grassy plains.


The climate is tropical. The eastern coastal belt is warm and comparatively dry (see Dahomey Gap); the southwest corner, hot and humid; and the north, hot and dry. Lake Volta, the world's largest artificial lake, extends through large portions of eastern Ghana.


Major Ethnic groups: Akan 49%, Moshi-Dagomba 16%, Ewe 13%, Ga 8%. European and other: 0.2%


Religions: Christian 63%, African beliefs 21%, Muslim 16%,  Facts on People of Ghana, accessed July 13, 2006


More than 100 languages and dialects are spoken in Ghana. English is the country's official language and predominates government and business affairs. It is also the standard language used for educational instruction. Native Ghanaian languages are divided into two linguistic subfamilies of the Niger-Congo language family. Languages belonging to the Kwa subfamily are found predominantly to the south of the Volta River, while those belonging to the Gur subfamily are found predominantly to the north. The Kwa group, which is spoken by about 75% of the country's population, includes the Akan, Ga-Dangme, and Ewe languages. The Gur group includes the Gurma, Grusi, and Dagbani languages.


Nine languages have the status of government-sponsored languages: Akan, Dagaare/Wale, Dagbani, Dangme, Ewe, Ga, Gonja, Kasem, and Nzema. Though not an official language, Hausa is the lingua-franca spoken among Ghana's Muslims, who comprise about 14% of the population.


Presently, Ghana has 18,530 primary schools, 8,850 junior secondary schools, 900 senior secondary schools, 28 training colleges, 20 technical institutions, 4 diploma-awarding institutions, 6 public universities and over 10 private universities. That means that most Ghanaians have relatively easy access to primary and secondary education. These numbers can be contrasted with the single university and handful of secondary and primary schools that existed at the time of independence in 1957. Ghana's spending on education has varied between 28 and 40 percent of its annual budget in the past decade. All teaching is done in English, Ghana's official language.


Ghana has a 6-year primary education system beginning at the age of six and, under the educational reforms implemented in 1987, they pass on to a 3-year junior secondary school (JSS) program. At the end of the 3rd year of JSS, there is a Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE). Those continuing must complete the 3-year senior secondary school (SSS) program and take an admission exam to enter university. School enrollment totals over 2 million: 1.3 million primary; 550,000 middle; 300,000 secondary; 84,280 technical; 18,000 teacher training, and 89,000 in university.


The shortage of places in post-secondary education is acute; only one out of nine senior secondary graduates finds a place in a technical, teacher-training, or four-year university program.


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*  Unite For Sight at Buduburam Refugee Camp, Ghana A Unite For Sight video documentary with interviews of residents at Buduburam Refugee Camp, Ghana. Unite For Sight provides free eye care for the residents.


*  Subayo Foundation A not for profit charity for women and children in Ghana based out of the US.


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Nikola Tesla (Serbian Cyrillic: ÐÐ¸ÐºÐ¾Ð»Ð° Ð¢ÐµÑÐ»Ð°) (July 10 1856   7 January 1943) was an inventor, physicist, mechanical engineer, and electrical engineer. Born in Smiljan, Croatian Krajina, Military Frontier, he was an ethnic Serb subject of the Austrian Empire and later became an American citizen. Tesla is best known for his many revolutionary contributions to the discipline of electricity and magnetism in the late 19th and early 20th century. Tesla's patents and theoretical work formed the basis of modern alternating current electric power (AC) systems, including the polyphase power distribution systems and the AC motor, with which he helped usher in the Second Industrial Revolution. Contemporary biographers of Tesla have deemed him "the man who invented the twentieth century" Title of a  biography by Robert Lomas (seen)  and "the patron saint of modern electricity." Seifer, "W


im "the man who invented the twentieth century" Title of a  biography by Robert Lomas (seen)  and "the patron saint of modern electricity." Seifer, "Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla," book synopsis


After his demonstration of wireless communication (radio) in 1893 and after being the victor in the "War of Currents", he was widely respected as America's greatest electrical engineer.  /ref> Much of his early work pioneered modern electrical engineering and many of his discoveries were of groundbreaking importance. During this period, in the United States, Tesla's fame rivaled that of any other inventor or scientist in history or popular culture, Harnessing the Wheelwork of Nature: Tesla's Science of Energy by Thomas Valone  but due to his eccentric personality and unbelievable and sometimes bizarre claims about possible scientific and technological developments, Tesla was ultimately ostracized and regarded as a mad scientist. Childress, David Hatcher, (ed.) "The Tesla Papers: Nikola Tesla on Free Energy & Wireless Transmission of Power". Adventures Unlimited Press, 2000. ISBN  Lomas,


David Hatcher, (ed.) "The Tesla Papers: Nikola Tesla on Free Energy & Wireless Transmission of Power". Adventures Unlimited Press, 2000. ISBN  Lomas, Robert, " The essay," Spark of genius. Independent Magazine, August 21 1999.  Never having put much focus on his finances, Tesla died impoverished at the age of 86.


The SI unit measuring magnetic flux density or magnetic induction (commonly known as the magnetic field  B\, ), the tesla, was named in his honour (at the ConfÃ©rence GÃ©nÃ©rale des Poids et Mesures, Paris, 1960).


Aside from his work on electromagnetism and engineering, Tesla is said to have contributed in varying degrees to the establishment of robotics, remote control, radar and computer science, and to the expansion of ballistics, nuclear physics Cheney, Margaret, "Tesla: Man Out of Time", 1979. ISBN 0743215362. Front cover flap , and theoretical physics. In 1943, the Supreme Court of the United States credited him as being the inventor of the radio. Many of his achievements have been used, with some controversy, to support various pseudosciences, UFO theories, and early new age occultism.


Tesla is honoured in both Serbia and Croatia, as well as his adopted home, the United States.


According to legend, Tesla was born precisely at midnight during an electrical storm, to a Serbian family in the village of Smiljan near GospiÄ, in the Lika region of the Croatian Krajina in Military Frontier (part of the Austrian Empire), in the present-day Croatia. Dommermuth-Costa, Carol, Nikola Tesla: A Spark of Genius, pp. 11-12. 1994. ISBN


Nikola Tesla's birth house and statue in Smiljan


His baptism certificate reports that he was born on June 28  (N.S. July 10) , 1856, and christened by the Serbian Orthodox priest Toma OklobdÅ¾ija. His father was Rev. Milutin Tesla, a priest in the Serbian Orthodox Church Metropolitanate of Sremski Karlovci. Milutin was born on 19 February 1819 in the village of Meduc, county Medak in Lika, Austrian Empire, as son of Nikola Tesla (b. 1789 in the military frontier, settled after his service in the Napoleonic Wars in Gospic in 1815) and Ana KaliniÄ, from the famous frontier Kalinic family. Tesla's family asserted its last name as such in Lika. His paternal origin is thought to be of the DraganiÄ family from the  Tara valley area below the geographical entity known as Old Vlach, from one of the local Serb clans; however genealogical research shows that Nikola is from the Herzegovinian noble KomnenoviÄ (modern-day Old Herzegovina in Mont


the local Serb clans; however genealogical research shows that Nikola is from the Herzegovinian noble KomnenoviÄ (modern-day Old Herzegovina in Montenegro), from its OrloviÄ subgroup that traces its origin from the semi-mythic Pavle Orlovic that bore Prince Lazar's banner at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. His mother was Äuka MandiÄ, herself a daughter of a Serbian Orthodox Church priest. She came from a family domiciled in Lika and Banija, but with deeper origins to Kosovo. She was talented in making home craft tools. She memorized many Serbian epic poems, but never learned to read. Seifer, "Wizard" p 7  His godfather, Jovan Drenovac, was a captain in the army protecting the Military Frontier.


Nikola was one of five children, having one brother (Dane, who was killed in a horse-riding accident when Nikola was five) and three sisters (Milka, Angelina and Marica). Margaret Cheney, Robert Uth, and Jim Glenn, "Tesla, Master of Lightning". Barnes & Noble Publishing, 1999. ISBN 0760710058.   His family moved to GospiÄ in 1862. Tesla went to school in Karlovac. He finished a four year term in the span of three years. Walker, E. H. (1900). Leaders of the 19th century with some noted characters of earlier times, their efforts and achievements in advancing human progress vividly portrayed for the guidance of present and future generations. Chicago: A.B. Kuhlman Co., Page 474.


Tesla then studied electrical engineering at the Austrian Polytechnic in Graz (1875). While there, he studied the uses of alternating current. Some sources say he received Baccalaureate degrees from the university at Graz.    " The Book of New York: Forty Years' Recollections of the American Metropolis"


says he matriculated 4 degrees (physics, mathematics, mechanical engineering and electrical engineering)


However, the university says that he did not receive a degree and  did not continue beyond the first semester of his third year, during which he stopped attending lectures.  Nikola Tesla: the European Years, D. Mrkich


Others have stated that he was discharged without a degree for nonpayment of his tuition for the first semester of his junior year.


According to a college roommate, he did not graduate.  . Cited in Seifer, Marc, The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla, 1996


In December 1878 he left Graz and broke all relations with his family. His friends thought that he had drowned in Mura. He went to Maribor, Slovenia, where he was first employed as an assistant engineer for a year. He suffered a nervous breakdown during this time. Tesla was later persuaded by his father to attend the Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague, which he attended for the summer term of 1880. However after his father died he left the university, having completed only one term.


Nikola Tesla as a young man


Tesla engaged in reading many works, memorizing complete books. He had a photographic memory.    Tesla related in his autobiography that he experienced detailed moments of inspiration. During his early life, Tesla was stricken with illness time and time again. He suffered a peculiar affliction in which blinding flashes of light would appear before his eyes, often accompanied by hallucinations. Much of the time the visions were linked to a word or idea he might have come across; just by hearing the name of an item, he would involuntarily envision it in realistic detail. Modern-day synesthetes report similar symptoms. Tesla would visualise an invention in his brain in precise form before moving to the construction stage; a technique sometimes known as picture thinking. Tesla also often had flashbacks to events that had happened previously in his life; this began to happen during childhood.


known as picture thinking. Tesla also often had flashbacks to events that had happened previously in his life; this began to happen during childhood.


In 1881, he moved to Budapest, Hungary, to work under Tivadar PuskÃ¡s in a telegraph company, James Grant Wilson, John Fiske, Appleton's CyclopÃ¦dia of American Biography. Page 261.


the National Telephone Company. There, he met NebojÅ¡a PetroviÄ, a young inventor from Austria. Although their encounter was brief, they did work on a project together using twin turbines to create continual power. On the opening of the telephone exchange in Budapest, 1881, Tesla became the chief electrician to the company, and was later engineer for the country's first telephone system. He also developed a device that, according to some, was a telephone repeater or amplifier, but according to others could have been the first loudspeaker. " Did Tesla really invent the loudspeaker?". Twenty First Century Books, Breckenridge, CO.


In 1882 he moved to Paris, France, to work as an engineer for the Continental Edison Company, designing improvements to electric equipment. In the same year, Tesla conceived the induction motor and began developing various devices that use rotating magnetic fields (for which he received patents in 1888).


Soon thereafter, Tesla hastened from Paris to his mother's side as she lay dying, arriving hours before her death in April, 1892.  Seifer, "Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla" - page 94


Her last words to him were, "You've arrived, NidÅ¾o, my pride." After her death, Tesla fell ill. He spent two to three weeks recuperating in GospiÄ and the village of Tomingaj near GraÄac, the birthplace of his mother.


On June 6, 1884, Tesla first arrived in the US in New York City. "Master of Lightning" by Public Broadcasting Service.  Website


He had little besides a letter of recommendation from Charles Batchelor, his manager in his previous job. In the letter of recommendation to Thomas Edison, Charles Batchelor wrote, "I know two great men and you are one of them; the other is this young man." Edison hired Tesla to work for his company Edison Machine Works. Tesla's work for Edison began with simple electrical engineering and quickly progressed to solving the company's most difficult problems. Tesla was offered the task of a complete redesign of the Edison company's direct current generators.


During his employment, Edison offered Tesla $50,000 (equivalent to about $1 million in 2006, adjusted for inflation)  Adjusting the reported given amount of money for inflation', the $50,000 in 1885 would equal $1,082,008.74 in 2006  if he redesigned Edison's inefficient motor and generators, an improvement in both service and economy.   Tesla said he worked night and day to redesign them and gave the Edison company several profitable new patents in the process. During the year of 1885, when Tesla inquired about the payment on the work, Edison replied to him, "Tesla, you don't understand our American humor," and reneged on his promise.  Clifford A. Pickover, Strange Brains and Genius: The Secret Lives of Eccentric Scientists and Madmen. HarperCollins, 1999. 352 pages. Page 14. ISBN 0688168949  "My Inventions" by Nikola Tesla, printed in Electrical Experimenter Feb-June, 1919. Reprinted,


perCollins, 1999. 352 pages. Page 14. ISBN 0688168949  "My Inventions" by Nikola Tesla, printed in Electrical Experimenter Feb-June, 1919. Reprinted, edited by Ben Johnson, New York: Barnes & Noble, 1982. ISBN


Tesla resigned when he was refused a raise to $25 per week. At Tesla's salary of $18 per week, the bonus would have amounted to over 53 years pay, and the amount was equal to the initial capital of the company. Jonnes,"Empire of light" p110


Tesla eventually found himself digging ditches for a short period of time â ironically for the Edison company. Edison had also never wanted to hear about Tesla's AC polyphase designs, believing that DC electricity was the future. Tesla focused intently on his AC polyphase system, even while digging ditches.


In 1886, Tesla formed his own company, Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing. The initial financial investors disagreed with Tesla on his plan for an alternating current motor and eventually relieved him of his duties at the company. Tesla worked in New York as a common laborer from 1886 to 1887 to feed himself and raise capital for his next project. In 1887, he constructed the initial brushless alternating current induction motor, which he demonstrated to the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (now IEEE) in 1888. In the same year, he developed the principles of his Tesla coil and began working with George Westinghouse at Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company's Pittsburgh labs. Westinghouse listened to his ideas for polyphase systems which would allow transmission of alternating current electricity over large distances.


systems which would allow transmission of alternating current electricity over large distances.