Why we love elephants
August 05 2022 – Cecily Morgan
Want to know what makes the Sumatran elephant so precious? Here are two key facts:
1. It’s the only recognised sub-species of Asian elephant.
2. It’s critically endangered, with fewer than 1800 left roaming Sumatra today.
Here at Critically Endangered, we’re hoping for a future where only the first fact remains true, and we’ve partnered up with WWF to help make that happen. How? With socks, of course…
A little bit about these big animals…
Native to the Indonesian island of Sumatra, the Sumatran elephant was officially upgraded from endangered to critically endangered by IUCN in 2011 after their population decreased by a staggering 80% over a period of just 75 years.
Such a rapid decline in numbers can be mainly attributed to habitat loss. Human settlements and plantations have encroached on their living space, which has led to a 69% reduction in their territory in the past 25 years.
As well as being a huge problem in itself, this habitat loss has caused a secondary problem in the form of human-elephant conflict. Given their now-small habitat, these elephants have a tendency to wander into human settlements and eat farmers’ crops. Sadly, the farmers have then been known to retaliate by shooting or poisoning them.
How WWF is helping…
Luckily, WWF is doing all it can to protect these beautiful animals. Most significantly, they launched their Flying Elephant Squad in 2004. Composed of rangers, a truck, and four trained elephants, this squad uses lots of noise to deter any wild Sumatran elephants from entering human settlements, thus preventing any potential human-elephant conflict.
They’re also doing all they can to ensure a healthy forest home for Sumatran elephants by calling on the Indonesian government, palm oil companies, and other conservation organisations to work together to protect the elephants’ habitat.
We’re determined to help these endangered animals and have three (yes, three!) sock designs that make it easy to do exactly that. Our original pink socks, our striped pink socks, and our brand new pink tie-dye socks are all supporting WWF’s work to protect Sumatran elephants so if you’d like to ensure a rosy future for these animals, simply head to our sock shop…
