Eland

Eland; Size, Weight, Diet, Photos, Habitat and Its Predators.

An eland is a large savannah antelope only found in Africa. There are two species of eland with the common one also known as southern elands called Taurotragus oryx and the giant eland called Taurotragus derbianus.

The common elands are found in the East and Southern African savannahs, woodlands and plains. They have a light brown or tan coat, often with faint white stripes on the sides and also have spiral horns. An adult male reaches a height of about 1.6 m (5.2 ft) and can weigh up to 900 kg (2,000 lbs) and females weigh up to 600 kg (1,300 lbs).

A giant eland is the largest antelope in the all world with a male weighing up to 1,000kg (2,200 lbs) and a female up to 600 kg (1,300 lbs). They have a reddish brown coat with darker white stripes and larger spiral horns. They are sighted in forests and savannahs of west and central Africa.

giant eland

Elands are typically herbivores, mainly feeding on grass, leaves and smaller tree branches.

Both species of eland are known for their ability to jump at great heights and distances despite their large size. they use postural movements and loud bark to warn each other of danger like presence of apex predators. They live in herds especially common elands live in herds of up to about 450 animals.

They prefer living in open lands and less dense forests. They are source of meat in countries they reside and their milk is also said to be very nutritious as it contains much of butter fat. Their skin as well is used for leather.

Elands are indigenous species of Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia,South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Our focus here will be on the common eland.

The Common Elands

The scientific name of the common elands, the Taurotragus oryx is composed of 3 words and these are Tauros a greek word referring to a bull, Tragos referring to a male goat and Oryx reffering to animals with pointed horns such as the common elands.

Physical Characteristics of Common Elands:

The common elands are giant spiral horned antelopes mainly found in Africa. Males are much larger than females with bulls weighing about 400 -942 kg and females weighing 300-600 kg.

They have well pronounced distinctive stripes on their smooth coats, dark garters, a spinal and markings on their legs. Coats of male elands are much darker and gets greyer with aging compared to the tan coat of females. 

Characteristics of Common Elands

Male elands are featured with a dense fur on their fore heads and also have a larger dewlap on their throats.

They both have spiral horns which are visible as small buds in newly born elands and become well pronounced in about 7 months. However, the spiral horns of the males are shorter and thicker with a height of about 43 to 66 cm compared to those of females which are about 51 to 69 cm.

Female elands use their horns to protect their young ones from predators while the males use them to wrestle with the rivals.

Because of their size, they are slow antelope species recorded to be with a peak speed of 40 km/h.  from their standing point, the matured elands can jump up to a distance of 2.6 meters when startled and the juveniles, because of their light weight can jump up to 3 meters.

Common elands can spend about 15 to 20 years in captivity and a few can spend up to 25 years though very rare.

Habitat and Distribution;

Common elands are found in open savannahs and woodlands of the southern Africa. They further distributed, extending to the north into Ethiopia and South Sudan, then west into Namibia and Angola, and south to South Africa.

They prefer occupying semi-arid areas which are featured with flowering plants, shrubs. They love inhabiting mountain tops with a height of about 4,600 meters, woodlands, bushes and open savannah, grass lands. They avoid wetlands, dense forests and deserts.

Elands in Lake Mburo National Park

Common elands are sighted in a variety of National Parks and game reserves around Africa and some of these in East Africa include Lake Mburo National Park and Kidepo Valley National Park in Uganda, and Akagera National Park in Rwanda.

They are also found in Nairobi National Park, Tsavo East National Park, Tsavo West National Park, and Masai Mara Game Reserve in Kenya, Serengeti National Park, Ruaha National Park and Tarangire National Park, and Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania.

Common Behaviors of Elands;

Common elands are nomadic meaning they don’t have fixed habitats, they move from one to another in search of food and water. They eat in the morning, rest in tree shades when the sun is at its peak and eat again in the evening.

However, during the rainy seasons, they can be seen grazing at any time of the day. They move and graze in herds of about 500 individual animals.

Although the male Elands have a tendency of wandering off individually or forming smaller male herds, the mothers and their infants stick to larger herds majorly for protection from predators. They like associating with other herbivores animals and are seen mixed up with herds of for example zebras and roan antelopes.

The male elands primarily make a flehmen response while sniffing the female genitals or urine which they urinate as a sign of fertility during their reproductive cycles but also urinate as a sign of infertility to the males who may be trying to sexually harass them.

Elands communicate via different vocalizations and gestures. They bark when they see any predator nearby as a sign to alert others and be prepared for the outcome.

The major predators of elands include the lions, leopards, hyenas, wild dogs, among others.

Diet of Elands; 

Elands are typically herbivores animals which prefer feeding on high protein succulent leaves from different flowering plants.

They also feed on low quality plants in absence of the nutritious ones and among these include the grass such as setaria and themeda, stem tubers, shrubs, seeds and smaller soft tree branches.

They drink water when present but they can also stay a good number of days in its absence and survive on that obtained from their food.

They are adaptable animals as the easily change with the change in their environment. They change their feeding habits depending on the season.

Sociality and Reproduction;

Female Elands typically reach sex maturity at around 2 to 3 years and males at about 4 to 5 years. However, the exact ag of sex maturity may vary depending on the environmental conditions and availability of food. They undergo a gestation of about 9 months and usually give birth to one calf just like humans.

Mating season usually starts when they gather on plentiful grass plains and males are seen chasing the females and testing their urine to see if they are fertile.

Female elands tend to be selective over males and prefer mating with the most dominant ones which results into bitterly fights among the males.

Eland Baby

During the mating season, males are seen keeping a closer distance to females and the females allows them to mount every after two to four hours. Dominant chosen males can mate with more than two females in a day.

Males, juveniles, and females and their infants tend to live in separate groups with the female group much larger and that of the males smaller. They stay, move and graze together. They occupy bushy areas during the dry periods and graze on the plains during the wet seasons.

Conservation of Elands;

The population of elands is documented to be stable and even increasing in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Malawi.

It is on a gradual decrease in some other countries like in Zimbabwe, they are in extinct due to poaching and habitat loss to human settlement and farming.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) reports that more than half of the estimated population of elands lives on the protected lands and 30% on the private land.

Protected lands that old big populations of common elands include Serengeti, Ruaha, in Tanzania, Omo in Ethiopia, Kafue and North Luangwa in Zambia, Nyika in Malawi, Etosha in Namibia, Drakensberg Park in South Africa, among others.

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