On the Kenya - Uganda boundary lies Mount Elgon . Inside this nonextant vent , there is a enthralling animal universe : Cave Elephants .
locate on the easterly side of Mount Elgon , within Kenya ’s Mount Elgon National Park , elephants serenely pasture in the forested surround during the day . However , at sunset , these elephants make their way up the mass and into the famous Kitum Cave .
The entrance is idyllic and is ground behind a beautiful waterfall and giving leafage . The captivation for these elephants is what lies on the Earth’s surface of the volcanic rock – salt .
Kitum Cave entrance.Image credit: Nina R viaWikimedia Commons(CC BY 2.0)
Elephantsneed minerals for a intelligent life style and gestation . Often , they get this from the stain or skirt vegetation , however , in this location rainfall is three times the amount in London , which makes the vegetation on the great deal mineral - depleted . This is why they go through all of this endeavour to traverse the rocky caves . These caves areabundantin calcium , magnesium , and sodium , and a single elephant can excavate up to20 kilograms(44 pounds ) of rock’n’roll in one nighttime .
The elephants have been add up here for centuries . This is evidenced by the entrance rampart , which is marked with gouges made by the tusks of previous elephant as they mine the salt - rich rock’n’roll . To get the nutrient they necessitate , elephants gouge their direction through at night in complete darkness . Some are pregnant and some bring their materialisation with them .
These elephants can expend several hours in the caves , both to mine the common salt and also to make their way safely through . They scrape the walls with their tusks and then collect the mineral - fat sand with their trunks .
These elephants have been chitchat for century , and have changed the structure , creating burrow with their tusks . The journeying and technique of scraping the walls are eliminate on from generation to genesis – something that only exists on Mount Elgon .
Historically , the cave - mining elephant ranged across the whole mountain on both the Ugandan and Kenyan side . lamentably , the population on the Ugandan side was wiped out in the seventies , which has leave no lasting elephant population on that side of the mountain .
On the Kenyan side , there are thought to be 350 elephants , however , this number is significantly modest than in the past . There are continuous threat from poach and human - elephant conflict . The human - elephant conflict is principally due to the elephants bust the young Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree seedling in Kenya and destroying crops , which has resulted in the expiry of elephant and humans likewise .
Now , there is a new undertaking called theMount Elgon Elephant Project . This was institute to supply the most comprehensive information about elephant behavior and to try and reduce the fight in Holy Order to mitigate any population falls and save the elephants from a alike fate to the Ugandan elephant side .
There are many foreign things that dwell in caves , fromsoft - ball size spidersto Olms , however , elephants must be one of our favorites !
