1. Endangered Species By: Riley Pennington

2. What is an endangered species? There are certain categories and stages of endangerment: Lower Risk, Threatened, and Extinct. These main stages are specified in lower categories, and the make a kind of chart to describe the chance of an organisms endangerment. An endangered species is basically a species that has been affected by a threat of biodiversity and needs a change in its environment or reproduction levels in order to survive.

3. The African Elephant(: Well, obviously this animal is one of the many animals that inhabit Africa. The African Elephant is similar to the Asian Elephant, only bigger in size. Females weigh up to 11,000 pounds and males weight up to about 13,000 pounds. It all depends on the elephant.

4. Elephant Facts: The African Elephant is the world’s largest land mammal. African Elephants spend 16-18 hours a day eating. Elephants are herbivores, which means that they don’t eat anything but plants. Elephants have big ivory tusks that vary from 5-8 feet in fully developed size! An African Elephants lifespan is very similar to the lifespan of a human being, living up to 70 years. African Elephants usually live in savannahs, woodlands, and grasslands. However, they also like tropical forests.

5. African Elephants are an endangered species and need our help! Now that you know a little bit about the African Elephant, you can see that they are very intelligent and peaceful creatures. Unfortunately, not everyone can leave these majestic creatures alone and out of harm. Poachers: People who hunt animals that aren’t supposed to be hunted; hunting illegally. The reason humans hunt elephants are for their very valuable and useful ivory tusks. Ivory is used to make jewelry and other decorations; as well as medicines in places like Zimbabwe. Poachers sometimes kill up to 1,000 of these animals at a time, all for the tusks they were graced with at 16 months old. There are laws that prohibit killing of African Elephants, but there are still selfish fiends out there that disobey the law.

6. Pros and Cons Of Elephants Life With ElephantsLife Without Elephants Transportation in some countries. Provide food for the tertiary species in the area. Maintain the amount of plant life so it doesn’t overpopulate. Absolutely no more ivory. The Ivory trade would no longer be an option for countries around the world.

7. What can be done to help? There are many different ways that humans can help the African Elephant from becoming extinct, and even possibly away from endangerment. Many countries have agreed to the laws against killing elephants for their ivory tusks. CITES (Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species) passed a law in 1980 on the ban of ivory trade. However, some of those countries are pro-trade, and would like to poach elephants again. The United States is also a part of CITES and they are against the ivory trade while other countries like Zimbabwe and South Africa consider the African Elephant a natural resource. What needs to be done is this; people need to petition against the ivory trade and refrain from inhabiting elephant home grounds. Some stuff has already been done to help these creatures. The USA has given grants and passed acts in 2002 to help preserve and conserve the land of the elephants. This will help the elephants with food and reproduction, to help keep their population stable and thriving. There is also an Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee. These are all baby steps into keeping the elephants alive.