Elephants can be friendly, but they can also be dangerous. They are large, powerful animals and can be unpredictable. Just how friendly an elephant is towards you depends on that individual elephant’s personality and life experiences. Elephants have unforgettable memories and can remember situations and people very well.
Let’s Not Forget They are Wild Animals
As these animals fight for survival, wild elephants can become highly unpredictable, just like most other wild animals. That does not mean wild elephants want to harm us particularly. In the wild, they want to live peacefully without human interference.
Elephants are protective of their babies. That means if you approach the baby elephant in any threatening way, the chances are the mother and other older members of the herd will treat you as a threat.
Another time elephants can become very angry towards humans and other animals are during their mating season.
During this period, the testosterone level of the male elephant becomes 60% higher than the average level. That is what makes the elephants highly irritated and excited all at the same time.
During this period, it is wiser for a human to stay clear of wild male elephants.
If you, by chance, come upon an elephant in the wild during this period, the best strategy is to back off slowly without making eye contact. During the mating season, the bull elephants often consider direct eye contact a challenge you can never win in any situation.
Captive Elephants Form Bond with Humans
Elephants rescued from the wild and given shelter in places tend to bond with their rescuers.
Elephants like to bond with people who respect and care for them.
If a baby elephant was raised by humans and plans to be released back into the wild, they need to do this with great care. Elephants need to be around their kind, and they thrive on each other. Elephants can become highly lonely if they are on their own. That’s why you must have some boundaries as a rescuer but still teach a baby elephant to be an elephant.
Elephants are extremely intelligent creatures with unforgettable memories. That means they remember every abuse and mistreatment they had to suffer until they were rescued. So, an abused elephant can become friendly towards the rescuer, but at the same time, it can become highly irritated towards the people who order them around. All in all, if you are just an elephant enthusiast, it is always advisable to check the health and other conditions of the elephants from a couple of 100 meters of distance.
Recommended read: Do Elephants Like to Be Petted?
Best Mother Award Goes To The Elephants
The gestation period of elephants is exceptionally high. The mother elephant carries the baby elephant for almost two years. Once the baby is born, the mother nurses it for years and protects it from danger. Even the other female herd members take on the responsibility together and help out with the arrival of the young.
Elephants have so much empathy towards each other. They are always consoling and comforting each other, especially during a distressing situation, just like humans but even better.
Elephants Mourn Their Dead
Elephants have so much empathy and intelligence that they demonstrate extreme mourning for a loss of an elephant.
If an elephant in a herd dies, the rest of the elephants showcase a kind of behaviour similar to mourning and grief, like humans.
The elephants caress the dead bones with their trunks and often stand near the deceased’s body for hours and even days.
Sometimes it has been seen that the elephants are trying to bury the remains of the dead elephant.
Elephants often return to the scene of a dying elephant many months after to mourn their friend or family.
Elephants do not display the same kind of behaviour towards other animals but are highly saddened by their own.
Elephants Can Mimic the Human Voice
There is a possibility that elephants can mimic human voices. In 2012, an elephant named Kosik mimicked five Korean words. Kosik achieved the five words by considering the anatomical difference between an elephant and a human. There is no doubt that the elephants do not comprehend the meaning of the words, more than likely. Elephants often try to mimic the sound of their trainers’ voices to form a bond with them. However, mimicking the behaviour of humans can only be achieved among elephants who have been in human contact during their formative years. Mimicking, if it is true, goes to show how intelligent and in touch elephants are.
Kosik achieved the sounds by putting his trunk into his mouth and making the sound.
