What would happen if 200,000 African mad sparrows attacked an elephant at the same time?

For many people, the idea of ​​a sparrow defeating an elephant is unthinkable , because the difference in body size between the two species is so great, the body length of a sparrow is only about ten centimeters, while an elephant is generally up to 4 meters long.

In 2017, an incident of "mad sparrows attacking elephants" occurred in Kenya, Africa. Photographer Antero Topp promptly captured images of elephants fleeing in fear before the appearance of thousands of mad birds at the Satao Camp waterhole in East Tsavo National Park, Kenya, East Africa.

More than 200,000 sparrows gathered into a giant flock and attacked 3 elephants. They not only pecked at the elephants' ears and trunks, but also attacked the elephants' eyes frantically. Each peck seemed not to be strong, but the continuous and dense attacks of 200,000 sparrows made the elephants feel frustrated and had to run away because there was no way to deal with the crazy flock of birds.

Photographer Antero Topp captured the moment elephants fled in fear from a flock of thousands of mad birds at the Satao Camp waterhole in East Tsavo National Park, Kenya, East Africa.

According to the Telegraph , photographer Antero Topp said that the flock of thousands of red-billed sparrows, the size of a giant cloud, was landing on large trees near waterholes.

"Suddenly, I heard a crack, crack., and it turned out that a branch had broken under the weight of the flock of birds, while each bird only weighed about 10 grams. You would hear an unbelievable noise when all the birds flew up at the same time ," Topp said.

"I was surprised to see the elephants retreat about 50m, some even ran away. Perhaps they were afraid of the huge size and the noisy calls in the air of the birds ," Topp told the Telegraph .

African Mad Sparrow

In fact, the sparrow that attacks elephants is called the red-billed finch (Quelea red-billed) . They are the most numerous bird species on our planet. They are distributed mainly in Africa, with a population of more than 10 billion.

This bird is quite modest in size, with a body length of only 10-13 cm and weighs less than 20 grams - this size is smaller than the sparrows we often see in Vietnam.

The Red-billed Sparrow is a bird with a rather beautiful appearance, especially the male. When it comes to breeding season, they will put on a new coat of feathers to attract the attention of the female. Although quite modest in size, in fact, the Red-billed Sparrow has a rather aggressive personality and likes to use flock tactics, so their fighting power is very great.

The large number of this bird species comes from their extremely strong reproductive ability , usually, their mating season will take place twice a year and each time they will lay about 5 eggs. What is even more surprising is that their eggs can hatch in a short time - after only about 10 warm days, the chicks will begin to drill the egg shell to get out.

It is worth mentioning that this bird is also called "feathered locust" by local African people , because they are omnivorous , they eat from insects to plants, often damaging local agriculture and forestry, especially when they gather into a huge flock - everything that happens will be similar to a locust plague.

The red-billed finch, scientifically known as Quelea quelea, is the bird with the largest population in the world, with about 1.5 billion breeding pairs, and an estimated 10 billion individuals living in sub-Saharan Africa.

So why do red-billed sparrows attack elephants?

The African bush elephant is the largest living creature on land, it can be said that they are one of the animals that have no natural predators outside the wild, even hyenas or lions do not dare to challenge elephants. So why are elephants attacked by red-billed sparrows? The answer may be one of the following reasons:

Red-billed sparrows are the world's most numerous wild birds. When they gather in large flocks, they can cause crop damage similar to that of locust swarms.

1. African elephants encroach on territory

In fact, red-billed sparrows attack elephants not because they want to turn elephants into prey.

As we know, any animal in nature has its own territory, and the red-billed sparrow is no exception. Since their main food is insects and seeds, their territory includes a large amount of grassland and trees, moreover, because their numbers are so large, this territory will also be very large.

As a result, they often come into conflict with African elephants, which often destroy grasslands and trees in search of food, which has caused serious harm to the interests of red-billed sparrows.

This bird feeds mainly on seeds of annual grasses, but also causes widespread damage to cereal crops. For this reason, it is sometimes called the "feathered locust of Africa".

2. African elephants have robbed them of their water source.

Animals in the wild conflict with each other mainly due to competition for resources to survive, and water is considered the most important resource. Moreover, the climate in Africa is very dry, especially in the dry season, water resources will become extremely scarce, so many animals will compete, even kill each other to gain water resources, including red-billed sparrows and African bush elephants.

African elephants live in herds and each can drink up to 90 liters of water per day, not only do they drink all the water of the red-billed finches but they also prevent the birds from drinking. Therefore, in order to survive, the red-billed finches have no choice but to gather in large flocks and attack the elephants to make them run away. Only then can the red-billed finches maintain their water supply and continue to live during the dry months.

In fact, not only elephants but also gibbons and deer are attacked by red-billed sparrows for this reason.