Wild elephant (Loxodonta africana) breeding herds respond to artificially transmitted seismic stimuli

O’Connell‐Rodwell, Caitlin E.; Wood, Jason; Rodwell, Timothy C.; Puria, Sunil; Partan, Sarah R.; ́Keefe, Robyn O; Shriver, D.; Arnason, Byron T.; Hart, Lynette A.

doi:10.1007/s00265-005-0136-2

Cited by 42 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…For example, we now know that elephants can detect low frequency rumbles at distances of several kilometeres (Garstang, et al, 1995;Langbauer, 2000), and can even detect seismic rumbles (O'Connell-Rodwell, et al, 2006), so it may be that elephants can follow the sounds of distant thunder to reach fresh water sources. Further investigation is required to determine how well this hypothesis accounts for the long-range movements of elephants.…”

Section: Space and Objectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elephant cognition in primate perspective

Byrne¹,

Bates²,

Moss

2009

CCBR

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On many of the staple measures of comparative psychology, elephants show no obvious differences from other mammals, such as primates: discrimination learning, memory, spontaneous tool use, etc. However, a range of more naturalistic measures have recently suggested that elephant cognition may be rather different. Wild elephants sub-categorize humans into groups, independently making this classification on the basis of scent or colour. In number discrimination, elephants show no effects of absolute magnitude or relative size disparity in making number judgements. In the social realm, elephants show empathy into the problems faced by others, and give hints of special abilities in cooperation, vocal imitation and perhaps teaching. Field data suggest that the elephant's vaunted reputation for memory may have a factual basis, in two ways. Elephants' ability to remember large-scale space over long periods suggests good cognitive mapping skills. Elephants' skill in keeping track of the current locations of many family members implies that working memory may be unusually developed, consistent with the laboratory finding that their quantity judgements do not show the usual magnitude effects.

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Section: Space and Objectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elephant cognition in primate perspective

Byrne¹,

Bates²,

Moss

2009

CCBR

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“…Behavioural and observational studies of the African elephant have revealed the capacity for ultra-low-frequency sound communication [Payne et al, 1986;Garstang, 2004] that is passed as both aerial and seismic sound waves [O'Connell-Rodwell et al, 2006]. O'ConnellRodwell et al [2006,2007,2011] convincingly demonstrated that free-roaming African elephants can detect and react appropriately to the seismic, in addition to the airborne, component of the infrasonic vocalizations produced by other elephants.…”

Section: Auditory and Vocalization System Specializations Of The Afrimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Let us imagine that a subordinate male is drinking at a water hole and he detects the infrasonic vocalization of a dominant male. He may pause his drinking and adopt the 'listening' posture commonly seen in elephants [O'Connell-Rodwell et al, 2006]. If the airborne component of the vocalization arrives 2,600 ms after the seismic component, he will know the dominant male is at least 1,000 m away and will likely relax and continue drinking; however, if the airborne wave were to arrive 260 ms after the seismic wave, he will know the dominate male is only approximately 100 m away.…”

Section: Auditory and Vocalization System Specializations Of The Afrimentioning

confidence: 99%

Architectural Organization of the African Elephant Diencephalon and Brainstem

Maseko

Patzke²,

Fuxé³

et al. 2013

Brain Behav Evol

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The current study examined the organization of the diencephalon and brainstem of the African elephant (Loxodonta africana) - a region of the elephant brain that has not been examined for at least 50 years. The current description, employing material amenable for use with modern neuroanatomical methods, shows that, for the most part, the elephant diencephalon and brainstem are what could be considered typically mammalian, with subtle differences in proportions and topology. The variations from these previous descriptions, where they occurred, were related to four specific aspects of neural information processing: (1) the motor systems, (2) the auditory and vocalization systems, (3) the orexinergic satiety/wakefulness centre of the hypothalamus and the locus coeruleus, and (4) the potential neurogenic lining of the brainstem. For the motor systems, three specific structures exhibited interesting differences in organization - the pars compacta of the substantia nigra, the facial motor nerve nucleus, and the inferior olivary nuclear complex, all related to the timing and learning of movements and likely related to the control of the trunk. The dopaminergic neurons of the substantia nigra appear to form distinct islands separated from each other by large fibre pathways, an appearance unique to the elephant. Each island may send topologically organized projections to the striatum forming a dopaminergic innervation mosaic that may relate to trunk movements. At least five regions of the combined vocalization production and auditory/seismic reception system were specialized, including the large and distinct nucleus ellipticus of the periaqueductal grey matter, the enlarged lateral superior olivary nucleus, the novel transverse infrageniculate nucleus of the dorsal thalamus, the enlarged dorsal column nuclei and the ventral posterior inferior nucleus of the dorsal thalamus. These specializations, related to production and reception of infrasound, allow the proposal of a novel concept regarding the reception and localization of infrasonic sources. The orexinergic system of the hypothalamus displayed a medial hypothalamic parvocellular cluster of neurons in addition to the magnocellular clusters typical of mammals located in the lateral hypothalamus, and a novel medial division of the locus coeruleus was observed in the pons. These systems are related to appetitive drive and promotion of wakefulness, two aspects of elephant behaviour that appear to be inextricably linked. Lastly, we observed an extensive potential neurogenic lining of the ventricles throughout the brainstem that is present in even quite old elephants, although the function of these cells remains elusive. These observations combined demonstrate that, while much of the elephant brainstem is typically mammalian, certain aspects of the anatomy related to specialized behaviour of elephants are present and instructive in understanding elephant behaviour.

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“…Elephant communication involves other modalities in addition to the auditory route, but this review is limited to air-borne vocal communication. Introductions to the literatures on other communication modalities can be found elsewhere, including olfactory [Rasmussen and Schulte, 1998;Rasmussen and Krishnamurthy, 2000;Rasmussen and Greenwood, 2003], visual and tactile [Langbauer, 2000;Kahl and Armstrong, 2002], and seismic communication [O'Connell-Rodwell et al, 2006.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Vocal communication in African Elephants (Loxodonta africana)

Soltis

2010

Zoo Biology

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Research on vocal communication in African elephants has increased in recent years, both in the wild and in captivity, providing an opportunity to present a comprehensive review of research related to their vocal behavior. Current data indicate that the vocal repertoire consists of perhaps nine acoustically distinct call types, "rumbles" being the most common and acoustically variable. Large vocal production anatomy is responsible for the low-frequency nature of rumbles, with fundamental frequencies in the infrasonic range. Additionally, resonant frequencies of rumbles implicate the trunk in addition to the oral cavity in shaping the acoustic structure of rumbles. Long-distance communication is thought possible because low-frequency sounds propagate more faithfully than high-frequency sounds, and elephants respond to rumbles at distances of up to 2.5 km. Elephant ear anatomy appears designed for detecting low frequencies, and experiments demonstrate that elephants can detect infrasonic tones and discriminate small frequency differences. Two vocal communication functions in the African elephant now have reasonable empirical support. First, closely bonded but spatially separated females engage in rumble exchanges, or "contact calls," that function to coordinate movement or reunite animals. Second, both males and females produce "mate attraction" rumbles that may advertise reproductive states to the opposite sex. Additionally, there is evidence that the structural variation in rumbles reflects the individual identity, reproductive state, and emotional state of callers. Growth in knowledge about the communication system of the African elephant has occurred from a rich combination of research on wild elephants in national parks and captive elephants in zoological parks.

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Wild elephant (Loxodonta africana) breeding herds respond to artificially transmitted seismic stimuli

Cited by 42 publications

References 25 publications

Elephant cognition in primate perspective

Elephant cognition in primate perspective

Architectural Organization of the African Elephant Diencephalon and Brainstem

Vocal communication in African Elephants (Loxodonta africana)

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