Naturally we can't talk about elephants without talking about their immense size. They are the largest living land mammal walking the earth today by a wide margin. Put this in perspective an adult male African elephant is easily twice as big as the second largest land mammal, the White Rhino, which weighs 2.5 tonnes and stands 6 feet tall at the shoulder

     With elephants the females are smaller in comparison to their opposite genders. Also African elephants are generally larger than their Asian counterparts. An Indian elephant can stand anywhere between 2 and 3.5 meters (6.6 - 11.5 feet) tall, depending on the gender, and have weights ranging between 4,400 - 11, 000 lbs. African elephants on the other hand, stand anywhere from 2.9 to 4 meters (8.5 - 13 feet) tall at the shoulder and weigh between 3 to 10 short tonnes (6,000 - 18,000 lbs).

      Great, you know about the size difference between the African and Asian elephants, but can you spot any other differences? The shape of their heads for instance. The African elephant has a single domed forhead, while the Asian has two. The reason for this difference is still unclear at this time.

     Also from this image you can see another diffenerence. Can you spot it? The ears? Correct! The ears on the African elephant are much larger compared to the Asian's. The Asian has smaller ears because it lives in a cooler tropical enviornment, while the African lives in a dry really hot habitat so it has larger ears. I'll explain the importance of the ears in a little bit. Fun Fact! Did you know that the elephants ears are vaguely shaped like their respective home lands? Yeah that's a thing, take a look!

     Another difference between the two species is a little less obvious, but very significant. The grip tips on the elephant's trunk. The Asian elephant has one "fingertip" on it's trunk, so to grab things, the elephant presses the tip against the broad underside of it's trunk. African elephants, on the other hand, has two aposable tips and because of this additional "finger" can pick up anything, from a banana to a tiny seed. Take a look!

      So now you know the differences between the two species time to move on to why they need the features that make elephants so well suited to their habitats. We'll start with the Asian Elephant.