Elephants Never Forget Their Mothers
By Sarah Ford on May 9, 2014
The bonds between mothers and daughters are often intensely strong and highly complicated—not just for humans, but for some animals as well.
Mothers are cherished in elephant societies, where one matriarch rules over a multigenerational family. Female elephants usually stay with their mother’s herd for life, helping to form strong and highly complex social structures in which the animals protect each other and help to raise their calves or offspring.
Morris Animal Foundation has invested in a number of studies to improve the health of these intelligent animals. Previous Foundation-funded research looked at the long-term effects of illegal poaching that decimated African elephant populations in the 1980s, and researchers showed that the populations were still suffering decades later.