Even after death, an elephant keeps feeding the savanna — for years

When Alexander, one of Kruger National Park's great tuskers, died of natural causes in 2009, scientists began watching the spot where he fell. Fifteen years of research led by Courtney Reed, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that fresh elephant sites can hold soil nitrogen up to 3,000 times higher than the land around them — and that eight years later, grazers still seek out the unusually rich grasses growing there. An elephant shapes its home in life; this work shows the gift keeps giving long after it is gone.