Most of us think of elephants as creatures of the wild: roaming savannahs, drinking from rivers, staying far away from human life. But a new study says that image doesn’t hold when the rains stop. According to the research, ‘Elephants move closer to humans when droughts are sustained’ by biologist Irene Bouwman of Radboud University, the longer a drought lasts, the more African elephants approach human settlements with potentially deadly consequences for both humans and animals.
The findings provide a sobering glimpse into what climate change could mean for human-wildlife coexistence in one of the world's most ecologically sensitive regions.
Elephants are built to roam; until drought changes everything
According to Bouwman’s research, under normal circumstances, African elephants are very mobile. They live in a habitat of about 2,000 square kilometers and, in that time, travel about 140 kilometers, or about 87 miles. That's a big area for any animal.
But drought messes with that pattern, in different ways depending on how long it lasts. According to the Radboud University study, elephants do retreat during a short-term drought of about one month. They stay close to rivers and lakes, shorten the distance they travel, and don’t wander into places where people live.
That caution, however, has a time limit.
After about a year, the rivers dry up and the risk spikes
According to Bouwman, once a drought stretches on for roughly a year, everything changes. Rivers and lakes that elephants once depended on begin to dry up. Lacking their usual watering places, the animals begin to migrate away from their natural landmarks and towards human habitation, where food and water are more readily available.
