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You've Probably Never Heard of This Elephant and It's Going Extinct

By not classifying the forest elephant as a separate species, the threat to these animals is largely underplayed, researchers say.

An entire species of elephant is hidden in plain sight, researchers say, and it's on the edge of extinction.

We all know there are Asian elephants and African elephants, but many researchers believe the latter can be further divided into two distinct species: the savanna elephant and the forest elephant. Yet because conservation groups have lumped African elephants into a single species, the forest elephant has been pushed to the brink of extinction, according to a research review published in The Annual Review of Animal Biosciences.

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Alfred Roca, a professor of animal sciences at the University of Illinois, co-authored the review, which surveyed reams of research that suggests, through DNA and physical attribute evidence, the forest elephant and the savanna elephant are distinct species. For one, there are the physical differences: forest elephants are smaller with rounded and smaller ears, longer, straighter tusks, distinct skull shapes, and unique vocalizations, Roca told me over the phone. There is also plenty of differences in the DNA of the two species, he explained.

"These two are genetically as different as chimps are from humans, roughly," Roca said, pointing in particular to research he conducted that compared the genetic difference between the species.

"Typically if two populations are separated and the difference between them accounts for 20 percent of genetic diversity, that's considered high," Roca said. "Between these two elephants species, it's more than 90 percent."

Some of the first research to provide evidence of two distinct species was a 2000 study of 275 elephant skulls kept in museums. Based only on the different shapes of the skulls, the researchers were able to distinguish forest elephants from savanna elephants 100 percent of the time. Since then, dozens of other papers have been published providing evidence of the two different species.

"It really is like saying that an increase in the lion population more than makes up for the loss of tigers"

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But conservation groups, including the International Union for Conservation of Nature, still do not recognize both species. The IUCN cites concerns that there may be hybrids that would be left in an "uncertain conservation status" if the two species were formalized, but Roca said the research shows this isn't a problem.

"You do have some hybrids, but those hybrids are not reproductively successful and that's what keeps the two species apart," Roca said.

In the past week, Thailand seized the two largest shipment of illegal ivory in the country's history, a combined total of 1,250 elephant tusks shipped from Kenya and the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to the Associated Press. The immense seizure was a stark reminder that elephant poaching is alive and well.

While some countries in Africa have had success in curbing the ivory trade and protecting their elephant populations, others have struggled to address the issue among more pressing regional concerns. Because the IUCN considers forest and savanna elephants one species, it states that the success in some parts of Africa makes up for the dwindling populations in others.

"The magnitude of ongoing increases in Southern and Eastern Africa are likely to outweigh the magnitude of any likely declines in the other two regions," the IUCN website reads.

The trouble is that the forest elephant populations are mostly found in the areas of Africa where poaching is still rampant. As a result, forest elephant populations dropped 62 percent between 2002 and 2011, with only about 100,000 forest elephants remaining, according to a 2013 study published in PLOS One.

"This drop was happening at the same times as the 'single species' was updated from endangered to vulnerable," Roca told me. "It really is like saying that an increase in the lion population more than makes up for the loss of tigers. When you're dealing with two different species, you have to treat them as two different species."

Roca said reclassifying the two species will help improve conservation efforts. Groups and governments can crack down on poaching of the forest elephants specifically and use DNA to track ivory back to areas where populations are in the most danger. But he said if changes aren't made soon, the forest elephant could disappear before we even realize it was here.

"The species is going extinct," he said. "And no one is even noticing."