One of the largest mysteries from nature is the origin of the Borneo elephant.
The North Eastern part of the island of Borneo is home to a small population of the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus). The Borneo elephant (Elephas maximus borneensis) is one of the four recognized subspecies of the Asian elephant. In fact these elephants are slightly smaller than the elephants from the Asian continent and hence the nick name pygmy elephant. The population contains only about 1500 animals, living in the Malaysian state of Sabah and occasionally at the other side of the border in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. The elephants of Borneo are about 30% smaller than their cousins.
The question that raised by many people is where do these elephants come from? Due to their limited distribution and the absence of fossils it was once thought that these animals were introduced by men. One theory is that the elephants arrived at Borneo as a gift for the local sultan in the 17th century. While the other theory favours a natural origin of the Bornean elephants.
Recently I found an article about the genetics about the Borneo elepant. It revealed that the pygmy elephant is genetically different from the Asian elephant on the mainland.
It also revealed that the genetic diversity within the population of pygmy is quite high. This excludes the possibility that these elephants are all descendants of a small group of elephants. Most likely they arrived on Borneo via a land bridge probably 11000 – 18000 years ago. But whether they arrived from Java or from the mainland of Asia is not clear. What I understood is that it is still unclear why they only live in North East Borneo, far from the possible land bridge(s).
Close encounter with the pygmy elephant
In 2016 I made a very nice trio through several natural reserves of Malaysian parts of Borneo. The famous Kinabantangan river was part of the trip. This is the second largest river of the island and flows in the North East of the island. Along the river many I spotted many wild animals, including proboscis monkeys, bearded pigs and orangutans. I will tell more about them in a future episode.
At the second day of our stay at the river lodge, guides told us that some elephants were spotted upstream. The other day we departed from the lodge in two smaller boats for our search for the elephants. It took a few hours before the trackers found tracks of these animals. We continued searching somewhat downstream again and yes there they were!
We saw a small family group of at least seven including a playful calf was fouraging on the riverbank. It was really fun to watch them and amazing to see the these giant pygmies disappearing in to the forest in the blink of an eye. It was still not over with our luck, when we were on the way back to the lodge we also found an elephant bull in the water. So with a good feeling I good say goodbye to the river.
