African Pygmy Elephant

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It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into African Forest Elephant. (Discuss)

The (African) Pygmy Elephant (Loxodonta pumilio) is said to be a secretive species, related to the African Forest Elephant and native to the Congo. In cryptozoology it is sometimes argued to be a separate species. A 2000 paper by the mammalogists Colin Groves and Peter Grubb argued that this species did not exist; "Pygmy Elephants" are merely extremely small or immature examples of the African Forest Elephant. Genetic analysis did not support the "Pygmy Elephant" concept either (Debruyne et al., 2003).

[edit] References

• Groves, P. & Grubb, P. 2000. Are there Pygmy Elephants? Elephant 2(4):8-10. [1]
• Debruyne, R., Holt, A. van, Barriel, V. & Tassy, P. 2003. Status of the so-called African pygmy elephant (Loxodonta pumilio (NOACK 1906)): phylogeny of cytochrome b and mitochondrial control region sequences. Comptes Rendus de Biologie 326(7):687-697. [2]

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