News

1. Elephant Snorkelling Secrets Unmasked 02/09/2002
2. How elephants 'snorkel' 31/08/2002
3. Elephants may talk via Vibrations 07/08/2002
4. Why elephants don't forget 4/19/2002
5. Eavesdropping on elephants 3/15/2000
6. Memories abound in Elephant Kingdom
7. Elephant Talk On Dateline NBC 8/23/98
8. Living With Elephants By Ian Douglas-Hamilton March 5,1997

Elephants May Talk Via Vibrations: 07/08/2002
 By National Geographic News

An article that goes into the use of vibrations by elephants to communicate with each other.

Again, this is not really new in the way of news but this article further validates the social world in which elephants live. Please see or Senses Section on the Elephant Repository for a detailed review of how an elephant's world is shaped by their social and physical capabilities (i.e. infrasound).

Click here to go to the story on National Geographic News

Why Elephants Don't Forget: 04/19/2002
 By BBC News Online's Helen Briggs

This is an article on BBC about  Karen McComb's experiments dealing with elephant memories. The fact that elephants have amazing memories (that in certain ways far surpasses our own memories) has been know for a very long time from both anecdotal and observational evidence.

McComb's study of wild African elephants has reinforced this belief and shows how dominant females build up a social memory as they get older.

Although this is nothing new, it is interesting research that further validates the social world in which elephants live. Please see or Senses Section on the Elephant Repository for a detailed review of how an elephant's world is shaped by their social and physical capabilities (i.e. infrasound).

Click here to go to the story on BBC

Eavesdropping on elephants
03/15/2000

This is an article and audio/video section on Katy Payne's current project on the communication of Forest Elephants. The story briefly covers the fact that elephants communicate through infrasound and details the sad fact that the opening of the ivory trade will have an extremely adverse effect on the elephants.

Listen to Katy Payne speak about the communication between Forest Elephants and their similarities to communication between whales.

For more information on the Ivory and CITES crisis please go to our CITES Crisis Centre on the Repository

Click here to go to the story

Memories abound in 'Elephant Kingdom
9/22/98

This is an article about elephants and their amazing memories. It is a must read for people interested in elephants. An eye opening story in this article describes an elephant trainer who released two captive elephants in Kenya more than fifteen years ago being reunited: one of the elephants had been injured on the foot in the wild and was resisting help. Guides took Moore to the elephant in the bush and all it took was a call out from his friend and the elephant not only recognized his voice but  Ian Douglas-Hamilton described how the elephant came up to Moore (the elephant trainer) and laid down and allowed a veterinarian to examine him. The elephant knew they were going to help and trusted his friend: "he lifted up his foot and was totally passive while his rescuers put in syringes and operated for an hour or so." What is amazing is the incredible memory and bond these animals possess. This article also has a  good look al the elephants in the IMAX film Africa´s Elephant Kingdom. When I was watching the film I wondered how they captured the charging scene of a huge female matriarch in the IMAX film. Read this article to find out. Also see the Events page for a lot more information

Elephant Talk On Dateline NBC
8/23/98

Dateline has a special on Katy Payne, an acoustic biologist at Cornell University Sunday Night. It featured some of her previous work dealing with studying Elephant's capability to communicate within infrasonic ranges of sound. Incidentally, most of these sounds are below human hearing levels. The story recalls her experiences back to 1984 when she was attempting to better learn how elephants communicate with each other and had a frustrating result until she honed in on the throbbing that was hitting her at different strengths.

Infrasound is a more efficient way of communicating long distances. This is a story that reads as a very recent discovery, but is a good exciting introduction into the "hidden" life of the elephant.

Sorry: this story is no longer available online...

Living With Elephants By Ian Douglas-Hamilton
The Uneasy Truce Between Elephants and People
March 5, 1997

This article offers a brief glimpse into the situation of coexistence between the Maasai pastoralists and elephants. Due to the attraction of tourists to the Amboseli area and surrounding national parks, in Kenya  the Maasai have a great potential to take advantage of this fairly unique situation. Of particular interest is the update by Ian Douglas-Hamilton on his further findings on his following of several radio-collared elephants for over a period of a year. He found that the 'famous' elephants of Amboseli ventured into Tanzania, and that they will also travel long distances between Tsavo National Park in the east and Amboseli. In the past, the Amboseli elephants were considered isolated to the national park. This finding stresses the importance of establishing safety corridors for the elephants to continue mixing in order to maintain the overall genetic diversity.

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