The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2021 - Issue 29

I t is said that elephants are the largest existing land animals on the Earth, with the African bush, the African forest and the Asian elephant being the three currently recognised species. Elephants date back to the time of the Roman Empire. However, during the Ice Age, it is believed that rela- tives of the elephants inhabited areas across Asia and Europe, namely the extinct mammoths with their curved tusks and the straight-tusked elephants that lived during the Middle and Late Pleistocene (Geological period). The African bush elephant is the largest of the three species, measuring up to 3 metres high and weighing up to 6 tonnes. They have more prominent ears than the other two, which are shaped like the African continent. The bush elephants are distributed across 37 African countries in forests, grasslands and woodlands, wetlands, and agricultural land. The African forest elephant, which resides in West Africa and the Congo Basin, is the smallest of the three, measuring 2.4 metres and weighing up to 5 tonnes. Whilst they have fascinating characteristics such as 150,000 muscle units in their trunks which are used to suck up water to drink and can contain up to 8 litres of water, their tusks are enlarged incisor teeth that first appear when they are around two years old, and they constantly have to eat, elephants are more endangered than ever. In the past century, 90% of African elephants have been wiped out primarily due to the ivory trade, and Asian elephants have declined by at least 50% in the last three generations. Create a smokey environment with Young Spirits’ first single cask Uhuru Scotch Whisky. Jada Brookes discovers the collaboration with TUSK charity behind the drink. THERE’S NO SMOKE WITHOUT FIRE bitedrinks Uhuru Scotch Whisky