Loxodonta africana The world's largest living land mammal is best known for its huge size, unique body parts, social behavior, and longevity. The animals' trunks, unique among living mammals, are versatile, enabling elephants to manipulate tiny objects or tear down huge tree limbs. Wide, padded feet enable elephants to walk quietly. Large, flappable ears help these huge animals to cool off, although elephants often must retreat to the shade or water during the hottest part of the day. Male African elephants of the savanna subspecies grow up to 25 feet long, stand up to 11 feet tall and weigh up to 14,000 pounds.
Males are usually larger than females.
African elephants live in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, although their range is now broken into patches. Small numbers of forest elephants live in dense equatorial forests from Zaire west to Mauritania, while savanna elephants are far more widespread in drier woodlands and savannas. Savanna elephants are now most common in Kenya, Tanzania, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and South Africa. African elephants live wherever they can find enough food and water with minimal disturbance from people. Most of the continent's elephants live on savannas and in dry woodlands.