Evolution of Elephants
What could be more fun than an elephant on the road?
Two elephants on the road - of course.
The above is a picture of african elephants (scientific name Loxodonta africanus). Below is a picture of an asian elephant (Elephas maximus). They are the only surviving members of a widespread and diverse group of animals.
The earliest known member of the elephant family (elephants are placed in the order Proboscidea) was an animal called moeritherium which lived approximately 50-60 million years ago. Moeritheres were small animals about the size of pigs. Bekow is a picture of a moeritherium skull. Note the large incisors.
Around 40 million years ago a group called the palaeomastadons split off from the moeritheriums. The palaeomastodons were to give rise to a diverse number of other species. Among them are Deinotheres,
mastadons,
stegodons, mammoths, and modern elephants. Here are two charts to help you keep them all straight. The first gives an outline of the main branches of the evolutionary history of elephants. It also gives a timeframe. keep in mind, when looking at it that that most of the groups contain more than one species. Stegodon, for example, is a genus (a group that contains one or more related species) that contains six species.
The next chart shows the more recent (about the last five million years) evolutionary history of the elephant family in more detail. There are a couple of interesting details in the chart. Notice that there are three species of Loxodonta (african elephant) and at least ten species of Elephas (asian elephant).
One other, interesting, fact that did not make it in the chart is that there is some evidence that asian elephants are more closely related to mammoths than to african elephants.
Other interesting facts:
Elephants are related to manatees and hyraxs
Elephants have specific sounds they use as greetings
Other interesting links:
Elephant Multimedia (movies and sounds)
Friday Ark
Cats, Dogs, Spiders and ? every Friday. We’ll post links to sites that have Friday (plus or minus a few days) photos of their chosen animals as I see them (photoshops at our discretion and humans only in supporting roles). Leave a comment or trackback…
Trackback by Modulator — June 17, 2005 @ 1:29 pm
Your link to Evolution Update should be updated.
Evolution Update is now Evolution Research News and has moved to http://www.evolutionresearchnews.org/
Thanks,
Stan
Comment by Stanley Spencer — August 30, 2007 @ 4:02 am
hi.my name is ebrahim.my major is biology.i want to know about evolution of elephants.thanks a lot
Comment by ebrahim — October 24, 2007 @ 7:25 pm
I just wanted to say thank you. This site was very usefull to me. Especially the pictures and diagrams.
Comment by celina — June 7, 2008 @ 5:11 am