African Wildlife & Environment Issue 78

KEEPING COOL So how does such a big animal keep cool during the hot African summer? Their large ears (in some males up to 2m in height) have much thinner skin and are filled with many blood capillaries.This plays a big role in helping the elephant control its body temperature. So how does this work? The elephant pumps all its blood through its ears a few times an hour.When it is hot the elephant flaps its ears and sprays mud and water on the ears which helps to cool down the blood flowing through them.When the elephant is cold it keeps its ears close to its body which helps to keep it warmer.The skin of the elephant is also covered with an intricate network of tiny cracks.When the elephant bathes, the mud and water gets caught in these cracks and when this slowly evaporates it has a cooling effect. Scientists have discovered that Elephants also have a secret trick to controlling their body temperature.They direct blood to small patches of skin scattered around their bodies with lots of blood capillaries, allowing them to lose heat quickly through these areas when needed.These are called thermal windows.What can we learn about temperature control from the elephant? Can we perhaps design buildings that use these strategies to stay warm and cool without air-conditioning? Could we place thermal windows in certain areas of the building walls to help with keeping the temperature exactly right? In hot environments could we design walls with cooling effects like the skin of the elephant?What ideas do you have for what we can learn from the elephant about keeping cool?

Elephants have no sweat glands and super

thick skin around most of the body.

WHY ELEPHANTS ARE IMPORTANT One can always see when an Elephant has moved through the landscape. Clues of their huge size and feeding can be seen everywhere.They are especially important as they help balance natural ecosystems and even the survival of certain plants. On the savannah, elephants feeding on trees and shrubs help to keep the plains open by allowing grass to grow, helping the animals that eat grass (grazers).They also distribute seeds that they have eaten in perfect parcels of compost (their dung), and boy do they drop a lot of parcels, sometimes up to 155kg of dung a day.They dig for water in times of drought and by doing so provide water for other creatures. Most importantly

they are an iconic species of Africa, people come from all over the world to see them and this helps bring money into reserves to help conserve the areas in which they are found. Elephants are such incredible gentle creatures and we have so much more to discover about these amazing creatures.

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62 | African Wildlife & Environment | Issue 78 (2021)