Chandima Fernando is one of the field scientists of the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society. He is currently on a two year leave of absence studying Advance GIS mapping in New Zealand.

It was March 28th 2014 - a Friday and the time was around 2.30 pm and we were at the Sanstha-pitiya wewa (tank/reservoir) in the Wasgamuwa National Park. There were around 40 elephants of different sexes and ages. Their activity level was very high, several were wallowing in mud and bathing in the tank, while others were feeding, drinking and socializing in various ways. Groups of baby elephants were playing and wrestling while two bulls were chasing each other around a grove of trees with the one behind attempting to grab the tail of the one in front.

There were four big dominant bulls with the main group, and according to habit most of the time they were checking females, sniffing and touching to check whether any of the females were in estrous. Also there were some juveniles with the main group.

Suddenly there was a thundering roar and a small elephant rushed out of the forest squealing loudly with a huge bull chasing behind it. At first observation the small elephant looked like a juvenile. The bull grabbed the small elephant from behind with its’ trunk and straight away mounted it from behind to copulate. The front legs of the bulls were on either side of the shoulders and head of the juvenile as he hunched over and held it fast. The big bull towering over the small elephant made it look like a dwarf.

Sexual dimorphism, the difference in size between male and female elephants can be huge sometimes. There is a wide range when it comes to male and female body sizes.

To us it looked like an impossible situation because the bull was four times the size of the small elephant. How the small elephant bore the weight of the huge bull was incredible since we expected it to tumble to the ground at his onslaught. But this was a good example of how bulls during mating tend to put most of their weight on their hind legs. At first we were not sure of the sex of the small elephant that had aroused the big bull. This made us think that we were observing some aberrant elephant sexual behaviour because at first it seemed the sex of the small elephant seemed irrelevant to the bull in his heightened sexual state.

But after we got back to the field house and went over the photos very closely we were able to identify the small elephant as a female. A rational and plausible explanation could be that the small female had come into oestrous for the first time. There are records of captive females as young as 4 years old mating and giving birth. Being a long lived animal, elephants similar to humans have huge variation when it comes to individual sexual development.

The obstreperous behaviour of the amorous bull drew the attention of the other females in the herd. They bunched together and rushed to where the bull was straddling the small female elephant. Standing in a row with mouths agape they screamed and roared at the bull showing their displeasure. The collective efforts of the females distracted the bull allowing the small female to get away. She ran to the herd screaming and was immediately surrounded by the mature females and they took off into the jungle with the bull following them.

The bull did not look as if it was in musth so it is intriguing what could’ve triggered the bull to behave in this manner? From the way the adult females in the herd had responded it is safe to assume that this was not normal and acceptable mating behaviour. I have though observed that sometimes male elephants express heightened testosterone levels when they are with females than when they are alone. This could lead to “unusual” sexual behaviours sometimes. These types of behaviours had been observed in certain animal species where changes or shifts have happened in their populations, e.g. the sex ratio is skewed or biased towards males. Such situations can increase male sexual aggression and lead to harassment of juveniles as observed in social animals like Sea Lions, Seals and primates.

Over the years while I have observed sexual behaviour in elephants, I had never observed anything like what happened today. This was the first time that I had observed such an unusual behaviour in a bull elephant. From the way the herd females had reacted it was obvious that the behaviour of the bull was unacceptable to these very social animals. The way the females responded also very clearly demonstrated how females in a herd come together to protect each other including juveniles and calves from any external threats.

Sex between adults and juveniles has not been recorded among elephants at least I could not find any references in the literature. Similar kinds of behaviours had been observed in chimpanzees and elephant seals, but they are not considered normal reproductive behaviour.

Observing and recording elephant behaviour is an important part of my field work in Wasgamuwa and trying to understand their sexual behaviour and reproduction is integral to these efforts. I’m very interested in the sexual behaviour of elephants mainly because it hasn’t been studied much in wild Asian elephants and we only know very little about it. Hopefully the studies I’m conducting in Wasgamuwa will help us to understand such complex behaviours in this highly social animal. Also such information is vital for the conservation of the endangered Asian elephant.