Elephants are no pushovers when it comes to walking great distances every day, and they even seem to have a knack for planning their demanding journeys. A new study puts the ingenuity of these mammals on full display, showing how they strategically choose certain routes to make their trips as efficient as possible.
The study, published in the Journal of Animal Ecology, shares several key findings that demonstrate how African savanna elephants move through challenging landscapes. Being the largest megaherbivores on Earth, these animals need to eat heaps of low-calorie vegetation to stay energized, yet their prodigious size makes moving around a physical ordeal. To save energy, the elephants deliberately travel through certain landscapes based on the terrain, vegetation, and water sources.
