Baby elephant alive and kicking
The second birthday of a baby elephant was celebrated in the Tehran Zoological Garden, also known as Eram Zoo, on Friday.
The two-year-old elephant calf called “Maysa” is living in a normal condition, said Mohammad Hassan Hosseini, the director of Eram Zoo, ISNA reported.
He added that Maysa’s deciduous teeth have completely grown and she weights 700 kilograms.
Hosseini said the Asian baby elephant weighed 70 kilograms when she was born.
Maysa is the baby of two Sri Lankan elephants transferred to Iran a decade ago.
Asian elephants’ features
Asian elephants live in the tropical forests and grasslands of Southeast Asia. They’re a little smaller than African elephants but can grow nine feet tall and weigh nearly six tons. Even newborns are on the hefty side, weighing some 200 pounds. Adults can eat 300 pounds in one day, nearly 75 times what the average human eats! An Asian elephant’s ideal meal includes roots, grasses, fruit, and bark.
Much of an Asian elephant’s time is spent searching for grub. In fact the animal may travel 50 miles a day to find food. Asian elephants also enjoy taking dips in the water. To cool down their backsides, the animals will fill their trunks with water and spray it over themselves like a hose.
Asian elephants are gentle and super-social. Related females live with their young in herds. To communicate with each other they use rumbles, bellows, growls, and moans. Some of their vocalizations can be heard more than a mile away.