Let’s talk about bulls. So far, when explaining elephant behaviour, I
have focused primarily on family groups.
Bull behavior, however, is quite different.
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| Males begin sparring at a very young age |
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| Older bulls spar, as well |
Young bulls remain with their
families for the first 10 to 13 years, but from the beginning, males will behave
differently than their female counterparts.
The first “male only” behaviour that you might come across is something called
“sparring.” As with many species,
elephant use playing to help prepare them for adult life. Since elephant do not hunt, males of all ages
and sizes spar in order to prepare to fight for the right to mate when they are
mature bulls. But, it is interesting to
note that when you see an older calf sparring with a younger one, he is very
gentle and careful not to overpower his little friend.
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| A mock charge from a young member of the Flower family |
If you are on safari, you may
also experience a mock charge from males – some as young as six months. Once you understand the behavior, it is quite
comical. The youngsters will almost
always wait until you are safely out of range, and then run after the car with
a loud trumpet as if to say, “guess I showed you.” The closer he is to Mum, the better. You will almost never witness this behaviour
in a young female.
When bulls start to mature,
they are slowly pushed out of the family.
This is a gradual process and, at first, they will come and go –
hesitant to leave the security of their mother.
But, it is mandatory, and mothers will become quite forceful, if
necessary.
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| A magnificent musth bull -- note the streaming temporal glands and the hourglass shape of the head |
For many years, it was
believed that bulls then primarily led solitary lives. However, in Joyce Poole’s extensive study of
bulls in Amboseli, she discovered that they do, in fact, form bonds and friendships
and, like us, prefer to hang out with their friends. In her study, Joyce also discovered that
bulls go into a state of sexual arousal known as musth. During this period, testosterone surges
through their system causing a significant change in behaviour. When bulls are in musth, they become much
more aggressive and have only one thing on their mind – mating – and they will
travel great distances in search of females in estrus. Bulls also are most apt to fight when they
are in musth, although, in actuality, this is rare. Because strength is a function of size and
bulls grow at the same rate throughout their entire lives, a young bull will
almost always defer to his senior. It is
not difficult to recognize when a bull is in musth because his temporal glands
are streaming and his penis dribbles a fluid that has a very strong odour. One must definitely exercise caution when
around a musth bull.
Contrary to what one might
think, it can be very difficult to differentiate between male and female
elephant, particularly the calves.
However, when looking at adults there are two helpful rules of
thumb: first, the under carriage of the
bulls tends to slope while that of the females is more of a flat line; and
second, the forehead of females is squared off while that of the males tends to
be more rounded. In addition, the older
bulls are substantially bigger than adult females, and they develop an
hourglass shape to their massive heads.
FOOTNOTE
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| Into the container for transport to Kora National Park |
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| Loading the sedated bull onto the flatbed truck |
In blog #10, we talked about
detusking elephant in an effort to discourage them from breaking into exclusion
zones. Several of the detusked bulls
have continued breaking fences on a regular basis; thus, the decision was made
to relocate them. With the support of
Kenya Wildlife Service’s highly skilled team, two of the bulls were
successfully moved to Kora National Park on June 4.
