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New analysis from Stellenbosch Univerity’s Division for Conservation Ecology has revealed that elephants have a ‘group odour’ amongst herd members, which comprises messages about age, gender and particular person identification.
Their sense of scent is so finely attuned that they’re able to recognise ‘herd membership,’ and might even differentiate between generations of the identical human household.
In accordance with the brand new analysis, elephants share a so-called ‘herd odour’ when going about their ritualised greeting ceremonies.
Written by Engela Duvenage
The African giants even have the uncanny potential to trace people. These are among the findings from analysis performed by Stellenbosch College (SU) elephant skilled Dr Katharina von Dürckheim.
Elephants’ sense of scent
‘Elephants depart urine and dung behind on these pathways. These are like communication hubs. They comprise olfactory messages that permit them to observe which different elephants are round and are probably able to mate,’ says von Dürckheim.
‘When there’s a spot of urine on the bottom, an elephant first blows onto the sandy spot to create a form of mud storm of particles. It’ll inhale deeply by means of the trunk, typically transferring particles to the Jacobsons’ organ by means of the roof of the mouth, in what we name a flehmen response.’
It was the extremely ritualised means that African elephants greet one another – one thing she had usually had the privilege of observing throughout elephant interactions at waterholes in varied nationwide parks – that attracted her to the subject.
‘African elephants have this fascinating, ritualised greeting ceremony once they get collectively. Regardless of how usually we’d work with the tame elephants, they’d nonetheless all the time do it too. They’d urinate, defecate, secrete from their temporal glands close to their eyes, rumble, trumpet, spin their our bodies round and fan their ears to waft one thing that I name ‘pachyderm fragrance’ round.’
Such behaviour, widespread to pachyderms corresponding to elephants, rhinos and hippos, is one thing that reminds Von Dürckheim of how butterflies and moths fan their wings to unfold pheromones.
Chemical messages
Von Dürckheim began asking herself: ‘What message is contained in these chemical messages that elephants secrete each single time? There should be some perform right here.’
Given her subject material, her analysis was really a mammoth activity. Over the course of a few years of examine, she was capable of do some ground-breaking analysis. Hers was the primary examine to deep dive into the chemistry behind secretions from the genitals and buccal and temporal glands of free-ranging African elephant females. The latter causes the standard ‘teary eyes’ of an African elephant feminine – one thing that’s seldom seen in Asian elephant females.
Her analysis exhibits that African elephants can discern between unfamiliar and acquainted members of their species from each urine and dung. They will additionally establish particular person elephants primarily based on what they decide up on from the ‘scent’ launched from the temporal gland, buccal and genital secretions.
Genetics not the important thing
On this, genetics – or whether or not an animal is expounded to a different or not – doesn’t appear to play a job. This was proven by means of her work on the so-called odour-gene covariance, or OGC. This subject has been explored in lots of different animals however von Dürckheim was the primary to deal with this in elephants.
‘To check OGC, you look at blood and DNA, and also you analyse the physique chemistry of associated and unrelated animals. You see whether or not due to genetic closeness, associated animals have a extra comparable chemical profile to one another than to unrelated animals.’
Whereas associated elephants did share many chemical compounds, she discovered that these different in depth and identification.
Her analysis revealed the existence of particular person identification odour profiles in African elephants, in addition to a signature for age encoded of their temporal gland and buccal secretions.
Von Dürckheim was particularly keen on whether or not there’s something like a tell-tale ‘herd odour’ or ‘group odour’, given the social lifetime of elephants, and their potential to recognise kinfolk. She couldn’t discover a hyperlink between herd odour and group genetic relatedness. Nonetheless, an odour for ‘herd membership’ and being a part of a selected grouping appears to exist.
As is the case within the social hyaena and meerkats, this elephant group odour seems to be the results of micro organism.
‘Micro organism could be shared by means of the frequent bodily and affiliative behaviour of elephants. Members of the identical group usually rub their our bodies towards one another and discover one another’s our bodies with their trunks, as an example.
‘That is probably what really creates a selected herd scent – not whether or not the animals are associated or not. Nonetheless, this doesn’t imply that elephants can not recognise kinfolk, or {that a} genetic signature for relatedness doesn’t exist. A lot analysis hints at urine containing a genetic marker. That is but to be researched in elephants.’
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