Source Information

SUMMARY: African elephants eat a wide variety of vegetation, including grass, herbs, shrubs, roots, fruit, and bark as well as foliage and twigs from trees. The proportion of grass versus browse in the diet reflects their availability and their nutrient value and changes with season. While a wide variety of plant species may be included in the diet, often a relative few make up the bulk of the diet. General: African elephants eat grass, foliage, bark and twigs from trees, herbs, shrubs, roots and fruit. (B147)

Foods eaten appears to vary seasonally: much more grass is consumed in the rainy season than in the dry season. (B147)

Elephants may push trees over to access edible leaves and twigs; this can modify habitat over large areas. (B147)

A study of the stomach contents of African elephants found that the average composition was: fibre 35.7%, carbohydrate 43.5%, protein 8.4%, fat 1.5%, minerals 8.4%. (B10.49.w21)

Savanna elephants eat grasses together with smaller quantities of leaves fro a variety of shrubs and trees. In the dry season when the grasses have dried up, they eat woods parts of trees and shrubs. Other food items include roots, and, when available, flowers and fruits. (B285.w3)

Early in the wet season, grasses are more nutritious than the mature leafy browse, of shrubs and trees, and are eaten preferentially. In the dry season the nutrient quality of grass is decreased, but that of leafy browse is higher, since many trees and shrubs flower and come into leaf at this time. (B384.9.w9)

The proportions of grass and browse eaten reflect their nutrient value and their availability. In Murchison, where little browse was available, grass made up 84 to 95% of the diet, on average. (B384.9.w9) In Ruaha Park, in a very dry year (1976) cow elephants were eating woody browse as more than 80% of their diet; on this diet their body condition declined. (B384.9.w9) In Hwange Park, grass was lass than 10% of the diet in mid-April to mid-November, increased to more than half the diet from mid-December to the end of March, peaking in February at 98% of the diet, while from July to September the diet was composed of twigs, bark and roots. It was noted that the diet was low in protein from July to late September or early October when the grass flushes. (B384.9.w9) When grass is in its first flush it is high in moisture and intake is balanced with more fibrous foods. (B384.9.w9)

More than 100 different species of plants may be eaten but only a few species make up the main bulk of the diet. (B384.9.w9)

In Hwange Park elephants have been recorded eating more than 87 browse species, 42 grasses and 36 forb species. (B384.9.w9)

In Kibale forest, Uganda, 227 of 255 known species present were eaten, but just 30 species made up 75% of the total quantity consumed. (B384.9.w9) Generally more herbaceous foliage than woody forge was taken on a volume basis, but feeding on woody vegetation occurred more commonly. Often woody vegetation was stripped of leaves without the stems being taken. (B384.9.w9)

Various grasses are eaten including short grasses such as star grass, taller species such as red-oat grass, Panicum , Setaria and Hyparrhenia and elephant grass, which may be eaten because no preferred species are available. In the wet season the leaves and flowers are taken; in the dry season leaf bases and roots of tussock grasses are eaten. (B384.9.w9)

, and and elephant grass, which may be eaten because no preferred species are available. In the wet season the leaves and flowers are taken; in the dry season leaf bases and roots of tussock grasses are eaten. (B384.9.w9) In Uganda, 99% of stomachs examined contained mature grass, 56% contained young grass and 35% contained a significant quantity of woody vegetation. Combretum binderianum was commonly present. (B384.9.w9)

was commonly present. (B384.9.w9) Combretums are often heavily browsed since they are often the first trees to produce new leaves after dry season fires. (B384.9.w9)

Acacias are also favoured food items. (B384.9.w9)

In Ruaha Park (semi-arid area), in the wet season the main foods were green grass and green browse while in the dry season woody browse was eaten. (B384.9.w9)

In the Kalahari sands, which are soft, roots tubers and bulbs are taken, such as roots of large-fruited combretum, variable combretum, sickle bush, silver terminalia and coppice bloodwood tree. (B384.9.w9)

In African swamps, newly grown heads of papyrus is a favoured food. Roots of papyrus (probably mainly young roots) are eaten when the parts of the plants above the surface have died. Roots of reeds such as phragmites are also eaten. (B384.9.w9)

are also eaten. (B384.9.w9) Cotton plants, particularly as the bolls start to open, are a preferred food item. (B384.9.w9)

A study in East Africa found that for elephants in the Murchison Falls National Park (Uganda), stomachs of elephants from the North bank population contained about 84% grasses, 14.5% bark and 1.5% browse. Grasses consumed included Sporabolus pyramidalis and Hyparrhenia sp., Combretum sp. browse was identified and Combretum binderanum and Terminalia velutina bark were noted. (P17.21.w1)

and sp., sp. browse was identified and and bark were noted. (P17.21.w1) The diet of African elephants varies seasonally and includes grasses, papyrus, moist, soft river and lake vegetation (particularly favoured by elderly individuals), fruits, leaves, buds, twigs, branches and bark from trees, flowers of some vines, shoots, leaves and stems of bamboo, roots of some trees, storage tubers, corms and bulbs on some plats, succulents such as aloes and Sansevieria etc. (B453.2.w2) Prefered foods include papyrus, reeds and river bank sedges, bamboo, baobab, some palms, aloes, Sansevieria and Borassus palm fruits. (B453.2.w2) Exotic plants such as banana, maize, citrus fruits, sisal, sugar cane etc. are also eaten. (B453.2.w2) Elderly elephants with little of their final molar remaining will stay in swamp or river bank areas and eat " soft moist stems of low sedges, rushes and papyrus." (B453.7.w7)

etc. (B453.2.w2) Food choice in elephants may be learned, from observation of other individuals in the herd, and maternal direction, rather than being instinctive. (B453.2.w2)

Elephants enjoy cultivated millet and the exotic cultivated bananas, mangoes, maize, oranges and sugar cane. (B453.8.w8)

Many studies have shown that grasses are an important component of the elephant's diet. (B451.5.w5) A study in Rwenzori National Park, Uganda, found that foods were eaten in proportion to their availability. During the period August to May, in a long grass area, the diet contained grass (45.0 - 92.5%, monthly mean 71.1%), browse (1.0-11.%, mean 6.4%) and forbes (1.5 - 49.0%, mean 22.9%), while in the short grass area the diet was composed of grass 31.0-74.0% (mean 54.8%), browse 8.0 - 45.0% (mean 20.6%), forbes 9.0-42.0% (mean 24.6%). (B451.5.w5). In both areas, but particularly in the short grass area, browse consumption increased in the dry season. It was noted that some browse was eaten in the long grass area even when some effort would have been required to find it, while in the short grass area, grass remained the dominant part of the diet even when browse was readily available and could have been eaten exclusively. (B451.5.w5) A study in the semi-arid north-east of Uganda, in Kidepo Valley National Park, found the diet was grass 46%, forbes 17%, trees 29% and shrubs 9%, with much less grass taken in the dry than in the wet months: 28.6% versus 57.2%. (B451.5.w5) In a study in Zimbabwe, based on observation of elephants while they were eating, overall, more browse was taken than grass, with a grass: browse ratio of 1:7.5 in the hot season when grass is dried up, but in the wet season, when grass is actively growing, the ratio was 1:0.4. (B451.5.w5)

Elephants do not just eat what is available, but actively choose what to eat. (B451.5.w5)

Elephants have often been observed to eat soils, which may provide minerals such as sodium and calcium. An additional function may be adsorption of toxic secondary plant compounds such as phenols in browse, with some soils chosen having high levels of kaolin (e.g. 35% in a soil eaten by elephants at Ngorongoro. (J82.31.w1)