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It's scary to think how much effect poaching can have. I've read that the propagation of the absent-tusk gene has resulted in the birth of large numbers of tuskless elephants, now approaching 30% in some populations (compare with a rate of about 1% in 1930). Tusklessness, once a very rare genetic abnormality, has become a widespread hereditary trait. It is possible, if unlikely, that continued poaching could bring about a complete absence of tusks in African elephants, a development normally requiring thousands of years of evolution. The effect of tuskless elephants on the environment, and on the elephants themselves, could be dramatic. Elephants use their tusks to root around in the ground for necessary minerals, tear apart vegetation, and spar with one another for mating rights.
There are of course other factors at work affecting tusk size in certain elephant populations. The tusks of Namibian elephants are more brittle than those of other elephants, due to a mineral deficiency, and so break easily when the elephant scrapes bark off trees, digs or fights.
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