Why can’t elephants jump?

Do you know why elephants can’t jump? It is curious that the elephant is the only animal with 4 knees and that it cannot use them to jump. He can’t jump, even with the help of a gale force wind. Let’s see why.

It is well known that elephants are incredible animals, in the article of the curiosities of the elephants that we published in Curious Planet you can reaffirm it.

Why can’t elephants jump?

1. Perhaps due to its weight . There is no definitive answer, as scientists themselves have not specifically studied why elephants cannot jump. But it is probably due to his weight as his leg muscles are relatively weak and his ankles very inflexible.

They are too heavy to be able to lift all four legs off the ground at once. However, the flea can jump up to 200 times its own height. This would be equivalent to a man jumping the Empire State Building in New York (which is 443.2 meters high: with 102 floors and a 62-meter antenna).

2. Maybe because it has low running stamina. Elephants are known to walk long distances, but they rarely run and only run for short distances, perhaps because elephants have little stamina to run.

They can’t go faster than 25 km/h when they run, and when they do they don’t go through the air. That is, they always have one foot on the ground when running.

To cite one case, rhinoceroses do fly when they run, although it is not known why they can do it while elephants cannot. Maybe it’s because the rhinos are stronger.

3. And finally, often in the animal kingdom, jumping is a means of escape. Small animals jump to escape predators, but the elephant does not need to because of its large size.

Of course, this is not proven, they are observations made by experts , to try to understand these majestic animals.