Original photo by Chedko/ Shutterstock
Other than being members of the class Mammalia, humans and elephants might seem to have little in common. But these seemingly disparate creatures, separated by 80 million years of evolution, have some stunning similarities. One of the most intimate (and adorable) is a behavior shared between newborn human babies and elephant calves. Just like a human infant sucks their thumb, a newborn elephant will do the same with its trunk, and for the same reason — comfort.
Oops, incorrect!
It's a fibElephants are known for their trunks, but plenty of other animals have them too, such as anteaters, shrews, and even a species of antelope. The most prominent example is the tapir, which looks like a pig with a trunk, though it’s more closely related to horses and rhinos.
During the first six months of life, our brains are biologically wired to suck on things, since that’s the primary way infants receive sustenance from their mothers. Thumb-sucking is also a way for babies to self-soothe during times of stress. For elephants, it’s a very similar situation. Since sucking is associated with food and their mothers, elephant calves will suck their trunks much like a natural pacifier — a pacifier with more than 40,000 muscles. An elephant calf also sucks its trunk to learn how to subtly manipulate this immensely important protuberance, and uses the technique as an enhanced form of smelling. So while much has changed since humans and elephants parted ways during the Late Cretaceous, there’s at least one stunning (and very cute) similarity.
Numbers Don't Lie
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The country with the largest population of elephants is ______.
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The country with the largest population of elephants is Botswana.
Elephants have the longest gestation period of any mammal.
Humans have a relatively long gestation period for mammals (especially compared to the Virginia opossum, which is pregnant for only 12 days), but a few animals outlast even us Homo sapiens. Manatees remain pregnant for 13 months, and giraffes can carry their young for two months beyond that, but all mammals pale in comparison to the African elephant, which has a gestation period of 22 months. There are two reasons for this nearly two-year-long pregnancy — one obvious, the other less so. The first is size. The African elephant is the largest land-dwelling mammal on Earth, and it takes time to grow such an enormous creature from a small clump of cells into a calf that weighs more than an average adult man. The second reason relates to an elephant’s amazing intellect, which includes a brain that is shaped similarly to our own but is three times larger. An elephant’s brain contains some 250 billion neurons, and the temporal lobe is particularly well developed because it allows elephants to create complex mental maps stretching hundreds of miles. Without this impressive memory, elephants couldn’t find their way back to life-sustaining watering holes year after year. So while an elephant pregnancy might seem incredibly long, it’s definitely time well spent.
Darren Orf lives in Portland, has a cat, and writes about all things science and climate. You can find his previous work at Popular Mechanics, Inverse, Gizmodo, and Paste, among others.
