Animal Diaries Archive

Thirsty girls

26 January 2007

They say that humans should drink on average one to two litres of water each day. To some of us that may seem quite a lot of water, but wait until you hear how much water elephants drink per day. Being such a large animal that can consume well over 150kg of food a day, it is safe to assume that elephants can get quite thirsty. An adult Asian Elephant, for example, can drink between 100 and 200 litres of water per day! In captivity, elephants may drink this amount over the course of the day. However in the wild, elephants travel on long migrations and may only come across water once a day. Therefore wild elephants will generally drink a large amount at once. Did you know that a thirsty adult bull can drink over 200 litres in just over four minutes? They are able to do this by storing water in their trunk and then transferring it into their mouth! It is amazing to think that an adult elephant can hold 8.5 litres of water in its trunk!

At our Zoo, the elephants have access to two large water troughs filled with fresh water, however they are known to also drink out of their pool, which is filled with fresh dam water. In the wild elephants drink by the river and also dig for water in dry river beds.