In Savanna, elephants eat weeds like Rubber Vine, Mesquite, Prickly Pear, etc. were killed and eaten. No one knew—they were all too busy feeding all the elephants every day. Next we got out the scale, a lot of baskets of food, and started weighing everything. The elephant needs about 180 liters of water per day. You can read about Addo Elephant Park, South Africa here. Do you know elephants take a long arduous journey in search of food and water? That’s why they eat a huge quantity of food to make up that loss. And this is just one of their 21 elephants. As herbivores, elephants consume grasses, tree foliage, bark, twigs, and other vegetation daily. In a zoo, a typical adult elephant may eat 4-5 Know what this means? of vegetation daily. How Much do Elephants Eat & Drink? We grow baby teeth and then replace them with permanent adult teeth. They take a nap just like us, at night under the starry sky of Africa or in the jungles of Asia. elephant. But, you can’t satisfy an elephant with a banana. Privacy Notice |  Sustainability Policy |  Terms of Service |  Code of Ethics, National Geographic Young Explorer Jay Simpson is part of the, The National Geographic Society is a global nonprofit organization that uses the power of science, exploration, education and storytelling to illuminate and protect the wonder of our world. Elephants may spend 12-18 hours a day feeding. How Much Do Elephants Eat? Elephants consume grasses, small plants, bushes, fruit, twigs, tree bark, and roots. Let’s know about what African and Asian elephants eat. Elephants in the wild consumes grass, leaves and such, with a high percentage of water, and may eat up to 300 kgs/day. They eat bananas. Do you know baby elephants eat their mother’s dung to digest their food? This story comes from Thailand, during a trip exploring ecotourism and wildlife that was completed in collaboration with Rafa Salvador. After finding it, they enjoy it together. They are die-hard vegetarians! Read the full story on what elephants eat, from flowers to figs to salt. of vegetation daily. And that’s your lot for the elephant’s diet. of vegetation daily. If you love elephants, traveling to Thailand can take you up-close and personal with the objects of your affection. Elephants, unlike people, do use their trunks to help them drink, but they only suck the water part of the way up and then use their trunks to squirt the water into their mouths. 1.15 "How much food and water do elephants eat/drink in a day?" To learn more, visit. Captive elephants consume much less than wild elephants because they spend less energy searching for food and are often guaranteed a next meal. an asian elephant can eat up to 300 pounds (136 kilograms) a day. They can consume as much as 150 kg (330 lb) of food and 40 L (11 US gal) of water in a day. How much does an elephant eat in a day? Want to know more interesting facts like, “what do elephants eat?” You can visit the following links. Both captive and wild elephants eat a lot, but what else would you expect from one of the largest land animals on the planet? That makes the quantity of food they require even larger. Q: How much do elephants eat and drink? They have to wait for a long day before refilling their belly again. In the wild they forage for food, constantly searching for roots, small trees, bamboo, grasses, and any other edible plants. Elephants may spend 12-18 hours a day feeding. Whatsoever, elephants adapted themselves to live on the green leaves nature grows on her kind breast and drinks from her eyes, to be specific from nearby water bodies. Adult elephants can eat between 200-600 pounds of food a day. The 20 best malaria-free safari destinations, The 6 greatest animal migrations in Africa. However, the digestion process lasts up to a day. Question: How much do the Zoo's elephants eat in a day? Here. © 1996 - 2019 National Geographic Society. There is no way out. How much does an elephant eat in a day? They also drink an insane amount of water – around 45 liters every day! Trees like Acacia and Bushwillow are also preferred by elephants. An adult bull consumes 300 kg of food a day (5% of its body weight). They browse from one tree to another for leaves, roots, barks, and twigs. All rights reserved. Along with other animals at the zoo Jardin des Plantes in Paris, both Castor and Pollux were killed and eaten. Elephants eat between 149 and 169 kg (330-375 lb.) Elephants are heroes of fairy tales not only in African and Asian countries, but even in those countries in which they are not found, such as Russia, for example. They generally cover long distances per day. In the wild one animal can consume as much as 600 pounds of food in a single day, although 250 – 300 pounds is a more typical amount. Moving 15-30 km with such a heavy body needs sufficient food for their survival. Elephants enjoy so many advantages because of their great size. African elephants mainly live on forest trees. They eat every kind of grass available in Asia. Elephants are not tiny animals that they can eat a leaf and sleep all day long. of vegetation daily. How Much Do Elephants Eat? For a day, an adult elephant eats up to 300 kg of grass and leaves, which is about 5% of their weight, and absorbs up to 200 liters of water, and in very hot weather even more. They also browse through shrubs and trees available in the zoo. The elephants here are deeply integrated with the human world, having been raised in captivity by traditional caretakers, called mahouts, following thousands of years of tradition (more blog posts about this coming soon). They are the real fighters of the animal planet. Elephants living there drink a lot of water to keep them hydrated and to store enough water in their body for their next trip. Even as Elephant’s World moves to farm more of their on food on their land, they struggle to have enough land to farm on. Elephants eat an average of 150 kg of food and 40 liters of water per day, for the following reasons: Here’s the main reason for an elephant eating that much. Something as big and heavy as an elephant must have a big appetite. Once weighed, we placed the food in a pile for the photograph. When What do elephants eat and drink? I can see why so many captive elephants in Thailand may be facing a lack of food or malnutrition from not having access to a proper diet. 27 Dec 2015 27 Dec 2015 ElephantsWorld Take a look at this beautiful video about Kammoon enjoying her diner! Regularly eat the soil, rich in the necessary mineral salts (iron, bicarbonate). Did any of these facts on what elephants eat surprise you, or any relevant facts you think we should add? Elephants love to eat all day. In a zoo, elephants generally eat different fruits, hay, pellets, and vegetables. To figure out what it takes to feed captive elephants, I headed to Elephant’s World, a sanctuary for elephants in Western Thailand. Elephants eat between 149 and 169 kg (330-375 lb.) In Latin, herba means “a small plant or herb” and vora means “to eat”. Elephants have very big appetites, eating as much as 440 lbs (200 kg) of plants in a single day! In total, excluding the wild foods the elephants forage every night, Elephant’s World estimates the cost of all the prepared food to be 2,910 Thai Baht (around $80 USD) daily. Researchers say that the bond between a mother and a calf is exceptionally deep. After logging in you can close it and return to this page. Living for around 70 years, an adult African elephant drinks approximately 200 litres (50 gallons) of water and consumes anything between 100 and 150 kg daily (220 – 330 pounds), which constitutes to about 70.000 calories (NatGeo b). In the Etosha region of Namibia, it is recorded that elephants living there move as far as 90-180 km per day in search of just some food! An elephant drinks an average of 40-45 liters of water in just a single day. Do you know how much do elephants eat per day? During the Siege of Paris in 1870, elephant meat was consumed, due to a severe shortage of food. If you own a pair of glasses, clean it with ease. They can eat for upwards of 16 hours a day. Elephants feed for 12-18 hours every day (that’s about three-quarters of their life!) Elephants love to eat tree bark and use their curved tusks to carve into the tree and tear off strips to feed on. As impressed as I was with our huge pile of food (and that Kamoon eats that much every day! They walk 10-20 km a day daily to find sufficient amounts of food and water for the whole family. To sustain such a gigantic figure, they have to eat that much. As many branches as possible. Elephants love to eat all day. But in the last hundred years Thailand has lost around 60 percent of their forests, making it difficult for mahouts to find adequate space and vegetation for their elephants to forage. Please do join in using the comments section below! National Geographic Headquarters 1145 17th Street NW Washington, DC 20036, National Geographic Society is a 501 (c)(3) organization. between a mother and a calf is exceptionally deep. It’s no surprise that elephants eat a ton of food every day – about 70 kg of food to be exact. Wild Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) can spend an average of 16-18 hours of every day eating. It does not come as a surprise that elephants can eat a lot. Since 1888, National Geographic has pushed the boundaries of exploration, investing in bold people and transformative ideas, providing more than 14,000 grants for work across all seven continents, reaching 3 million students each year through education offerings, and engaging audiences around the globe through signature experiences, stories and content. Now, an elephant has flat teeth to grind the leaves and tusks to rip the bark off from a tree. Elephants living in different regions of the planet eat different things. Some males have smaller, inwards laying tusks called tushes, which only stick about 5 centimetres (0.16 feet) out of the mouth. Adult elephants need up to 160 L of water a day. The majority of that is hay – up to 300 By investigating “how much food does a Thai elephant eat in a day?” I was reminded just how connected food is to health, welfare, and our environment—for elephants and humans alike. Read the complete tale of how much does an elephant weigh. Question: How much do the Zoo's elephants eat in a day? In fact they are virtual eating machines. You can read about African vs Asian Elephant, Which Is Which? The huge body of an elephant needs an analogous amount of food. They even try to eat up the soul of a tree! It looks pretty dry to us but it … Jay Simpson is a Digital Storyteller and National Geographic Young Explorer researching our relationship with wildlife and interventions in human-wildlife conflicts. They are fed according to their body-mass index and biological functioning. Meat is not on their diet list. Major feeding bouts take place in the morning, afternoon and night. Elephants make use of a variety of vegetarian substances to meet their enormous dietary requirements. Follow us for instant access to all of our best safari & wildlife content: They need a lot of energy to sustain themselves. #AskZooATL - Ep. So we hatched a plan for the following day: to recruit as many of the daily visitors and staff as possible to work for over two hours collecting and piling all the food together to feed a single elephant. So herbivores are animals that eat only vegetables and/or vegetation. Please log in again. This story comes from Thailand, during a trip exploring ecotourism and wildlife that was completed in collaboration with Rafa Salvador. Answer: The Zoo’s five African elephants eat between 100 and 400 pounds of food a day, depending on the elephant. An average adult can eat up to 136 kgs (300 pounds) of food in a single day. Tree bark is a favorite food source for elephants. The majority of that is hay – up to 300 pounds for Willy alone! Yes, in a single day. On average, the larger adult male elephants will eat 250 – 300 pounds (113 to 136 kg) of food every DAY. Very interesting to see. Read on for the definitive guide to what elephants eat. During my time traveling in Thailand to explore this unique relationship, I had to wonder: what does it take to feed a captive elephant? Adult elephants can eat between 200-600 pounds of food a day. The amount of food they eat depends on various factors, like the environment of their habitat, food availability, and other biological needs. As the largest land animals alive, you’d probably expect elephants to eat a lot. Much of the grasses and plants that elephants eat aren’t actually digested by elephants so this simply comes out in their dung. If anything is green nearby, they tend to latch onto it. To meet this need, elephants spend about 75% of their time, both day and night, finding and eating food. Sitting around the dinner table with their staff, I asked them if anyone could guess what one day’s worth of food for an elephant looked like if it was all piled together. Elephants can eat an average of 150-160 kg of food in a day! An adult African elephant consumes between 100-270 kg of food every day! Read more of Jay’s stories and follow him on Instagram and Twitter. In those cases, they drink a huge amount of water to compensate for the loss of water from their body. Elephants eat between 149 and 169 kg (330-375 lb.) How much do elephants eat? It is going to be too heavy. On average, the larger adult male elephants will eat 250 – 300 pounds (113 to 136 kg) of food every DAY. Elephants consume grasses, small plants, bushes, fruit, twigs, tree bark, and roots. And you’d be right; the number of calories one elephant can eat in a day could sustain a person for months, no jokes. In the case of kids, they feed on twigs and leaves. ), I was struck with a few observations that changed the way I saw this completely. How Much does an Elephant Eat? Then why should they eat less? African elephants are called “browsers” for their food habit. They can eat a bunch of it easily. But the main diet remains the same. Do you know about the upside-down tree? No, elephants are herbivorous animals. Some are known to eat up to 500 pounds (226 kg) of food, or more, in the wild. To make our “Elephant Buffet” menu, we decided to base all of our calculations on one elephant: Kamoon, an older female that has been at Elephant’s World since it opened in 2008. Elephants may feed for up to 16 hours a day. of food for our lucky 3,500 kg (7,700 lb!) During the day: Eating branches. They are strict vegetarians. The elephant’s trunk is a combination of their nose and upper lip and is able to touch, grasp and smell. Elephants eat between 149 and 169 kg (330-375 lb.) Elephants are mammals but don’t grow teeth just like us. And they’re not the only ones—mahouts all over Thailand face a lack of vegetation and farm lands on which to grow their own foods. 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