Ouch! See a Croc Grab Hold of an Elephant’s Trunk

This is a classic case of biting off more than you can chew. A herd of elephants are at a river taking a drink when one of them gets a nasty shock. A crocodile clamps onto its trunk with its huge jaws! It only takes a few seconds for the reptile to realize that it has made a huge mistake. What it thought was a tasty morsel has a huge and furious animal at the end of it! The elephant is not prepared to leave it at that! It stamps around in the water hoping to crush the pesky croc – who has probably got as far away from the shore as it can!

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How Do Elephants Normally Drink?

African elephants eat and drink a lot! They consume up to 330 pounds of food each day and need a lot of water to swallow it down. The average elephant drinks between 20 and 50 gallons of water every day. They may do this in one go or whenever water is available. If they have to, they can go for several days without drinking.

Elephants drink using their trunk but that does not mean that they suck up water like a straw. Instead, they suck water into their trunk and then squirt it into their mouths. An elephant can hold more than 2 gallons of water at a time.

What Do Elephants Use Their Trunks For?

An elephant’s trunk is a vital part of their anatomy. They can be over 6 feet in length and weigh over 400 pounds. A trunk is actually a fusion of the elephant’s nose and upper lip. At the end of it, there are two nostrils and eight major muscles run up each side. Elephant trunks contain no bone or cartilage!

One function of the trunk is breathing. Elephants inhale 70 percent of their air through their trunk and the rest is breathed through their mouth. Amazingly, elephants can use their trunk as a snorkel if they have to travel through deep water.

You will also see elephants using their trunk as a tool for moving things around. The tip is prehensile and is capable of grasping smaller objects. Elephants also use their trunks for smelling, and for spraying dust over their bodies. Finally, trunks are vital for the production of sound which elephants use during courting and for communicating with the rest of the herd.

The photo featured at the top of this post is © Dmytro Gilitukha/Shutterstock.com