Scientific name:
Loxodonta africana

Natural spread:
Africa

from the Asian elephant differs so considerably the African elephant, that one placed it into an independent type. Subtypes let themselves it distinguish:

1. the gigantic, big-ear-y steppe-elephant (Loxodonta africana oxyotis). it is the biggest subtype and lives in the northern and southern west-Africa, the northern central-Africa and East-Africa.

2. the smaller, round-ear-ier forest-elephant (Loxodonta africana cyclotis). it lives in the forests of west-Africa and the Congo-area.

Shape With its body-height from up to 4 m and a weight of 7,5 tons with the biggest copies of the steppe-elephant is the African elephant the heaviest country-mammal of the present. its forehead is flat, fleeing and sometimes has a back-good rise above the trunk-base. The highest point of the body is not the head but the back. The ears are very big, fanlike and resemble the African continent in the outline. The trunk-top possesses two corner-y fort-sentences (trunk-fingers), that sit at the waiter and sub-edge, in contrast to the Asian elephant but is trained more weakly than with the Asian forms. The trunk shows deep cross-wrinkles while it is smoothly with the Asian elephant.