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How did the elephant seal survive being driven to the brink of extinction in the nineteenth century? What variables determine the lifetime reproductive success of individual seals? How have elephant seals adapted to tolerate remarkable physiological extremes of nutrition, temperature, asphyxia, and pressure? Answering these questions and many more, this book is the result of the author's 50-year study of elephant seals. The chapters cover a broad range of topics including diving, feeding, migration and reproductive behavior, yielding fundamental information on general biological principles, the operation of natural selection, the evolution of social behavior, the formation of vocal dialects, colony development, and population changes over time. The book will be a valuable resource for graduate students and researchers of marine mammal behavior and reproductive life history as well as for amateur naturalists interested in these fascinating animals.

Elephant seals --- Elephant seals. --- Adaptation.

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Asiatic elephant --- Wildlife conservation --- Asiatic elephant. --- Wildlife conservation. --- Asia.

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African elephant. --- Mammals --- Amboseli National Park (Kenya)

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Elephant seals, weighing up to 2000 kilograms, are not only the largest seals but among the most impressive of all marine mammals. Brought to the brink of extinction by nineteenth-century hunters, the northern species has achieved a recovery that is unmatched by any other marine vertebrate. Elephant seals are capable of tolerating remarkable physiological extremes of nutrition, temperature, and pressure. They spend more time underwater than most whales and dive deeper and longer than any other marine mammal. Lactating females and the largest breeding males during the mating season can lose up to forty percent of their body weight through prolonged fasting. For these and other reasons, the elephant seal has been the subject of intensive study in the northern and the southern hemispheres. Elephant Seals, the first book-length discussion of the species, gathers together the research findings of scientists working along the North American coast from California to Alaska and in the circumpolar waters of the Antarctic. It documents for the first time the worldwide status of elephant seals, noting both the remarkable resurgence of the northern species and the troubling decline of certain populations in the south, which some attribute to human factors such as fishing and global warming. Among the studies discussed by the authors are those involving cutting-edge research on the seals' diving patterns, biannual migration, and foraging locations, carried out with the use of microcomputer diving instruments attached to free-ranging seals. Others include research on the life-history tactics critical to a population's success - juvenile survivorship, female and male reproductive strategies, and prey consumed. The book concludes with an analysis of the remarkable physiological mechanisms that make possible the elephant seals' long breath-holds during diving and sleep, that set limits on foraging, and that regulate their hormones and fuel metabolism while fasting. An important and timely volume, Elephant Seals offers not only a worldwide status report on these impressive mammals but also the most comprehensive and up-to-date account of their behavioral biology. For the information it contains, for the methodological innovations it reports, and for its relevance to the debate about the human causes of species extinction, this book is essential reading for all marine mammalogists, behavioral ecologists, and managers of marine mammals.

Elephant seals. --- Elephant seals --- Zoology --- Health & Biological Sciences --- Vertebrates --- Macrorhinus --- Mirounga --- Morunga --- Rhinophoca --- Sea elephants --- Phocidae

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Ukufa kukaShaka is a historical drama by Elliot Zondi, first published in 1960 in the Bantu (later, African) Treasury Series. Its plot is based on the events surrounding the assassination of Shaka, the mighty Zulu king, by his two half-brothers, Dingane and Mhlangana, aided and abetted by his paternal aunt, Mkabayi, in 1828. The play explores the classic theme of the tragic hero's fatal flaws: hubris and overconfidence. Shaka's ruthless ambition led him to overstep human boundaries, kill with impunity, bar his warriors from having families and force them into endless wars. His blind spot seems to have been to put the survival and expansion of the Zulu kingdom first and the welfare of his subjects second.

Against this backdrop Mkabayi, whose ambitions for a remarkable Zulu nation were more tempered, played a decisive role in his downfall. Zondi explores arguments both in favour of and against Shaka's assassination in a way that allows the reader to sympathise with his greater vision and his thwarted plan to fight impending colonialism. His dramatisation of the conflict between Shaka and Mkabayi highlights questions of leadership and nation-building that continue to be relevant today.

Shaka, --- Zulu drama. --- Zulu literature --- Chaka, --- Shaka kaSenzangakhona, --- Shaka Zulu, --- Tshaka, --- U-Shaka, --- Great Elephant,