Elephant Study Reveals Social Bonds, Communication Skills
Animals play key role in forest ecology
August 29, 2011
Kanthi and Kamalia, with their calves, are the most inseparable pair of elephants biologist Shermin de Silva has ever observed.
Those who think of elephants as solitary, gentle giants lumbering quietly in their zoo enclosures might be surprised by the range and force of their distinctive calls to each other in the wild.
Shermin de Silva, a University of Pennsylvania biologist, identifies that as a “trumpet” sound, one of 14 distinct vocalizations she and her colleagues have recorded in Sri Lanka’s Uda Walawe National Park over the past six years.
“Trumpets are produced actually in situations of distress," says de Silva. "So they are not particularly happy vocalizations. They are either excited or distressed. But in addition to the trumpets, Asian elephants produce a very peculiar kind of sound that I call ‘squeaks.’"
“Squeaks tend to be produced also in situations of alarm and in situations of submission. So when an elephant is backing away from an opponent or backing away from in some cases, people, and alarmed by people or jackals or perceived threats, they also produced an elongated form of that called 'squeals.' ”
(Slideshow Courtesy Shermin de Silva/University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences)
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