Bhunte went all geeky when he got a chance to travel to Biwako lake (Shiga, Japan) where the Akebono elephants (Stegodon aurorae) stayed 1.8 million years ago. Called ‘dwarf’ elephants, Akebono elephants were 1.93 m tall (shoulder height). Bhunte was fascinated to learn that these elephants were the evolved form of the Mie elephant, Stegodon miensis, around 4 million years ago, whose ancestors were the tall Stegodon zdanskyi (around 3.6 m) from mainland China. Bhunte kept on scratching his head as he was perplexed that his father and mother are 2.8 m to 2.4 m tall, the Akebono elephants are just 2 m (adults) and the Zdanskyi elephants being 4 m tall! Bhunte was determined to know the reason behind it. He researched and got to know something called “Foster’s rule” or “the island rule” which states that the bigger species tend to become small to adjust the resource use in a smaller landscape- such as an island- and the smaller ones tend to be big- as resources are plenty and threats are lesser! Bhunte was still confused. But he knew that the Akebono elephants became dwarfs to survive on the island ‘Japan’. Bhunte was glad to know about his prehistoric ancestors and he started his quests to know more…His next quest is the Naumann elephant!