African forest elephants are smaller than their savannah cousins — but still impressively large! A fully grown adult can weigh up to 2,700 kilograms and stand about 2.5 metres tall at the shoulder. Their tusks are straighter and point downward, which helps them move through dense forest without catching on branches.
Forest elephants are sometimes called the 'gardeners of the forest'. When they eat fruit and wander long distances through the jungle, they scatter seeds in their dung, helping new trees to grow far from their parent. Some large trees in the Congo rainforest can only sprout after passing through an elephant's stomach!
These elephants communicate in deep, rumbling sounds that are too low for human ears to hear — called infrasound. They can send and receive these rumbles through the ground itself, feeling the vibrations with their huge feet. This means two elephants can 'talk' to each other through the forest floor from many kilometres apart.
Forest elephants move along ancient trails through the jungle that have been used by elephants for thousands of years. These paths, packed down by generations of heavy footsteps, are so well-worn that other animals also use them as routes through the dense vegetation.