Why are elephants better suited for warm climates when the square cube law dictates they should have trouble dissipating heat?

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My understanding of the square cube law, should it need to be corrected: The larger an animal is, the less skin (and therefore heat dissipating area) it will have for its size.

I read somewhere that animals of the same species tend to be larger in colder climates, so to my understanding, it should relate to elephants as well, but if that’s the case, how do they thrive in the heat where they live?

Thank you!

In: Biology

7 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

As big as modern tropical elephants are, their extinct relatives in temperate and polar regions (mammoths and straight tusked elephants) were actually often somewhat larger.

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