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Teeny, Tiny, Bite-Size Elephants!? (Thai "Water Elephants")

H

hachihyaku

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Anyone remember this?

There was a very not-well-publicized thing a few years back about a collection of miniature, petrified elephants. They could fit in your hand. They have been Xrayed and have bones in them.

I find this VERY intriguing, hoax or not, and I want one XD

I remember seeing ONE (1) web page about this, which itself was full of many other very weird things I've never seen anywhere else, but that was a year or two ago and I don't even remember how I found it.

These ARE NOT pygmy elephants. Those are like 6 feet tall. These are, literally, two inches tall.

If anyone has any info at ALL about these things, or you're just interested in this, post it here.

(Actually, it might have been on a "Beyond Bizarre" show awhile back...)
 
Miniature elephants? Sounds very bizarre, and more than a little implausible. If it indeed isn't a hoax, it would truly be a zoological sensation. I mean, how did such a miniature species evolve. Why?

However, I saw a Tv program some years ago about the discovery of a tribe of mammoths that had survived the rest of their kin on an island to the north of western Siberia. This group of mammoths lived there until approx 3000-4000 years ago and became smaller and smaller, due to the limited food supplies. I think the average height toe to head was ca 4.5-5 feet (I may nto remember it totally coorectly however). My own theory is of course that the mammoths are still alive on this island and have become smaller and smaller. The scientists should make a new expedition and bring magnifying glasses with them :p
 
I think I'll try do some searching on the net for this.. Hopefully I will find something in the next few days.

On a side note, Hachihyaku-san, do you speak japanese? I was just curious because 800 is Happyaku (due to the fusing and palatalization of mora "chi" in hachi and the h-fonem in hyaku), not Hachihyaku.
 
Slightly irrelevant, but my friend and I, after a long night of discussion (and alchahol), decided that the best pet imaginable would be a 1ft high woolly mammoth.

More relevant though: The closest living relative to the elephant is the Hyrax, a 2 foot long African rodent. Think beaver/wombat type thing.
 
Did these incredibly small elephants have tusks? I'm curious if they might've been fetal specimens. Still, even an elephant still in the fetal stage would surely be larger than that. I have a whitetail deer which is about that size; however, it's quite clear it's still a fetus. These animals appeared normal, except for the size?
 
sveand said:
I think I'll try do some searching on the net for this.. Hopefully I will find something in the next few days.

On a side note, Hachihyaku-san, do you speak japanese? I was just curious because 800 is Happyaku (due to the fusing and palatalization of mora "chi" in hachi and the h-fonem in hyaku), not Hachihyaku.
Click to expand...

My name comes from an anime where there's a character whose name is spelled 800, and they mispronounce it on purpose for some reason.

I'm glad someone noticed though :)

I've looked EVERYWHERE for info on these things. The reason it intrigues me so is that it's so patently absurd. There's two possibilites I see: one, that a species of two-inch tall elephants evolved in Asia (if I remember right that's where these are from), and two, someone is making dozens of hoaxed realistic elephants with bones and skin and all.

For both possibilities, WHY??

I saw ONE web page a long time ago with these, and if I remember right it had a bunch of other incredibly strange animals on it, none of which I had ever heard of before. I HAVE seen it on TV on more than one occasion, myself, with my own eyes. I saw them put one in a CAT scan and get a perfect mini pachyderm Xray. At least two shows have had five-minute segments on this.

Any info, even if you can give me the show it was on, would help. I'm at a loss here.
 
TorgosPizza said:
Did these incredibly small elephants have tusks? I'm curious if they might've been fetal specimens. Still, even an elephant still in the fetal stage would surely be larger than that. I have a whitetail deer which is about that size; however, it's quite clear it's still a fetus. These animals appeared normal, except for the size?
Click to expand...

They had full tusks and in all ways looked like a tiny full grown elephant. The head was normal elephant size, proportionally.
 
sorry but the best pet would have to be the minature panther in the old bounty bar advert...

and dont worry we all love the ideas of mini elephants !
 
Well, actually...

There is a case to be made for the existence of tiny elephants. Pygmy elephants do exist, although they are not inches tall but about a meter tall. A scientific debate has arisen since their discovery as to whether or not they are a subspecies of the Indian elephant or a different species of elephants all together.
 
Just some extra info. The island on which mammoths survived until aboot 3700 years ago (according to radiocarbon dating) was called Wrangel island.
 
Any data of any kind, at all, about this? I figured of anyone knew where to find this, it's be someone here.

NOBODY has heard of this??
 
hey hachihyaku

i found a picture of your tiny elephant for you

geocities.com/evamonroe/tinyely.htm
Link and website are dead. No archived version found at the Wayback Machine.

hope its the one you where loooking for.. it apparently livesi n a river somewhere :confused:
 
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What on earth is it? It is elephant shaped, but is it actually an elephant?

Carole
 
carole said:
What on earth is it? It is elephant shaped, but is it actually an elephant?

Carole
Click to expand...

its definately not an embryo as my GF is an expert in shit liek this and she said to me for an embryo of an elephant (which holds it baby for 2 years before its born) to develop a fully developed trunk eye ear would take atleat 6 - 9 months and this means the actual embryo would be the size of a dog.. not the size of a mans hand.. so what ever it is it definately isnt the embryo

i think its a space elephant from the planet zantark.. im drunk and off to bed for some lovin
 
To me it looks like a bad carving of an elephant. The veiny texture of it looks like some kind of mineral/stone to me and not an embryo. Probably carved for one of those cute "line of gradually getting smaller elephants troupe" that people have on their mantelpiece after coming back from africa.
 
Looks like a carving to me as well. A geologist would probably be able to tell you what kind of stone was used as well. But you say the ones you saw had skeletons, so it couldn't be them.
 
right, i'll email the picture to my geology flatmate(s) and see what their almost proffesional opinion is.
Ross
 
there is only so much we can tell from a photograph altho i dont think it looks like its a carving but then again thats my opinion
 
not if its made of stone (unless your the big rock muncher guy in never ending sotry)
 
Well, I reckon it would taste OK with a bit of barbeque sauce, Art!

Carole
 
I was in Oxfam earlier, and they sell little stone elephants that look a bit like that (just add a bit of photoshop here and a dab of make-up there). About the same size, too.

Sorry to dash anyone's bonsai elephant hopes or anything.

:p
 
Yay! :D


This is an example of the kind of animal I'm talking about. The texture of the elephant is supposedly like toughened skin, and when these are CAT scanned, tiny elephant bones are inside.

It's not Photoshopped; there are several examples of these, and I saw part of a documentary on them. It's a real SOMETHING in the guy's hand.

Here's my question though: WHY would anyone make a fake shrunken elephant, complete with real bones and skin? It's so absurd that it would never be taken seriously. Of course, the other explanation, the idea that there are living 2-inch tall elephants, is even MORE absurd.

That's why I love these things: there is no real good explanation. Any explanation is so patently absurd as to be false outright.

RS: Where did you find the picture? I remember a whole site about these, but have not been able to find it again.
 
Well, I was thinking about if it shouldn't be possible to make a dragon out of assorted lizard bones. Then add muscles and some form of scales. Maybe someone wanted to do the same with an elephant.
 
The smallest member of the elephant family I've ever heard of is the Elephas Falconeri, examples of which have been found in Sicily.

I think these were about 3 or 4 ft high. So a baby one might be quite small, but surely not that small.
 
Well there are numerous examples of "Jenny Hanivers," but if all of these little elephants are fakes like that, they're damn good ones. These don't have any kind of visible stitching or staples or anything, and these is no metal inside.


I think we can rule out a baby or fetal REAL elephant, since the proportions seem to match an adult rather than a child.
 
My geology flatmates supposedly expert opinion:
"um, it could be some kind of stone"
So there you go then.
 
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