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London, April 27 (ANI): A new study has shown that elephants utter a distinctive rumble in response to the sound of bees, signalling troop members to flee their attackers.
According to researchers, this is the first time elephants have been found to make specific sounds to warn of particular threats, although they have also been observed ‘roaring’ when threatened by lions.
“Six out of 10 elephant families fled from the loudspeaker when we played the ”bee rumble” compared to just two when we played a control rumble and one with the same call shifted to a different frequency,” New Scientist quoted Lucy King of the University of Oxford, who heads a team in Kenya investigating the meanings of elephant vocalisations, as saying.
The fleeing elephants also shook their heads violently, as if trying to deflect bees.
The new study opens up the possibility of using recordings of the ‘bee rumble’ as a deterrent as well, helping to prevent potential conflict between humans and elephants.
Elephants are terrified of bees because they can crawl into their trunk and sting them from inside it. They also sting around the animals” eyes, leaving painful welts that take weeks to disappear.
According to the researchers, the rumbles alert both the elephant”s family and neighbouring herds to the threat, and may teach young elephants that bees are dangerous.
The study has been published in the Journal PLoS ONE. (ANI)
Bhubaneswar (Orissa), Apr 24 (ANI): Forest rangers and game wardens of the Wildlife Department conducted a comprehensive elephant census in Orissa.
Around 10,000 personnel were deployed in this survey done in the reserve and other forest areas to determine the number of wild elephants in the State.
The three-day exercise, conducted in about 129,700 square kilometres of forest area was done to determine the exact number of jumbos.
The trained personnel were provided necessary kits to track the elephants in the wild through their footmarks and dung prior to the exercise.
It was reported that they would sit and wait on Machans (structures made of bamboos and leaves) to sight the elephants.
Divisional Forest Officer, Chandaka Range, A K Patnaik, said the direct sighting method was used to spot the herd of elephants.
The last elephant census in Orissa was conducted in 2007. (ANI)
An elephant given as a present to former Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito 40 years ago has died suddenly, a Croatian newspaper reported on Wednesday.
Late Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi gave Sony to the communist leader in 1970 when the bull elephant was a two-year-old calf, the Jutarnji List daily reported.
Sony, who lived at Croatia’s northern national Brijuni islands park where Mr Tito had a private zoo, died on Friday.
An autopsy is to determine the cause of his death. In the wild, elephants can live up to 70 years.
The islands were once reserved for Mr Tito and his close friends but are now frequented by officials and tourists.
Sony lived there among other exotic animals including Lanka, a cow elephant.
“We were all shocked by his death. We simply cannot believe that he is not here any more,” Vesna Klunic of the national park told the media.
“Now we will take special care of Lanka since it’s not easy for her.”
Mr Tito ruled the former Yugoslav federation, of which Croatia was a part, for 35 years until his death in 1980.
A decade after his death, Yugoslavia broke up in a series of internecine wars.
London, Mar 30 (ANI): Elephants move like a 4×4 vehicle with all four legs used to accelerate and brake, boffins have found.
In their research, scientists discovered that elephants eliminate the separation of functions of the front and back legs despite having an anatomy very similar to other four-legged animals.
Power is applied independently to each limb, reports The Daily Express.
Other animals that walk on all fours use the hind limbs for power and their forelegs for braking.
“Elephant legs function in very strange and probably unique ways,” said Dr John Hutchinson, of the Royal Veterinary College, London.
Earlier it was thought that elephants needed rigid pillar-like legs to support their weight but in fact they flex like humans. (ANI)
London, Mar 29 (ANI): Singer Katy Perry is said to have surprised celebrity blogger Perez Hilton when she arrived at his birthday party on an elephant.
The party, held on March 27 to celebrate Hilton’s 32nd birthday, saw a host of other stars, including Melanie Brown, Lindsay Lohan, Paula Abdul, Liza Minnelli, Justin Bieber and Leona Lewis, reports the Daily Star.
Lewis started off the party at Paramount Studios by singing ‘Bleeding Love’ and ‘Outta My Head’, and thanking the blogger for his support, while rapper Eve and Minnelli also performed.
The highlight of the circus-themed event came after a montage of video tributes from the likes of Kylie Minogue and Lady Gaga.
Then scantily clad Perry, 25, arrived, singing Happy Birthday, while sitting on the elephant. (ANI)
Environmentalists say the Northern Territory Government’s new rainwater tank rebate needs to be accompanied by low-level water restrictions to effectively reduce water use.
Stuart Blanch from the NT Environment Centre has welcomed the rebate worth up to $1900, but wants a ban on hosing paved areas and using sprinklers when it is raining.
He says there is a mistaken belief that the Top End has unlimited water.
“It seems crazy that in January and February you could drive around Darwin during some heavy periods of rain and see sprinklers coming on automatically even when it’s pouring rain and some of those seem to be on areas owned and managed by the Territory Government,” he said.
“Now that can’t continue.”
Mr Blanch says incentives alone will not achieve the Government’s goal of reducing household water use by 30 per cent over the next 10 years.
“The elephant in the room really is to have permanent low-level restrictions on inappropriate use for example sprinklers on days when it’s raining or using hoses on paved areas like footpaths.”
Guwahati, Mar. 16 (ANI): Guwahati Zoo is looking after a baby elephant, whose mother was killed recently by a speeding train.
The two-week old calf has been keeping the authorities busy at the Assam State Zoo-cum-Botanical Garden.
The zookeepers are feeding the calf with lactogen milk and are taking extensive care to save the young one from catching any infection.
A team of veterinary doctors is deputed to keep a watch on the calf”s health round the clock.
“Basically it is dehydration and infection; if we can protect the animal from these two initially then, perhaps, there can be no problem,” said Narayan Mahanta, divisional forest officer, Assam state zoo.
“We have taken the challenges, we have experienced veterinarians and we have experienced animal keepers, mahouts, all are taking care of the animal and till now everything is in right direction. There is not much problem,” he added.
The baby elephant has become a darling of the zookeepers, since the death of its mother.
The mother of the elephant was killed at the Deepor Beel, known as an elephant-bathing zone in the state.
Many elephants and wild animals have been hit by trains along this particular stretch of railway track, which passes through lush forest area. (ANI)
London, March 16 (ANI): Gay couples can head to Mount Everest for marriage, as Nepal tourist board is hosting world””s highest same-sex marriage on the base camp of the mountain in a bid to boost the country’s tourism industry.
The authorities believe gay tourists generally tend to spend more than backpackers who prefer cheap tours.
“They do have a lot of income … they are high-spending consumers. If they behave well, if they have money, we don””t discriminate,” the Sun quoted Aditya Baral, spokesman for the Nepal Tourism Board, as saying.
He added: “With that, money will come here and jobs will be created.”
Baral said gay tourists could get married at Everest base camp and honeymoon on an elephant safari.
Tourism fetched Nepal around 350million dollars last year. (ANI)
A nine-year moratorium on the ivory trade will be challenged at a United Nations-led meeting of 175 countries starting in Doha today.
Tanzania and Zambia have put in a proposal to down-list local populations of elephants to allow new stockpile sales of ivory.
The European Union was instrumental in securing a nine-year moratorium on the trade.
But Vera Weber from the conservation group the Franz Weber Foundation says the EU is now considering supporting proposal.
“It’s very surprising to see Europe going against 23 African countries that are for the total conservation of elephants and totally against any ivory trade,” she said.
“It’s like giving the green light to poaching and massacres of elephants in Africa.”
China and Japan are the main markets for elephant tusk.
It is likely they will support the plan.
There are 23 African nations that back an ongoing ban on the ivory trade.
A vote will be taken at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, which starts in Doha this weekend.
Washington, September 19 (ANI): The American Physical Society (APS), in the latest podcast of ‘Life Lines’, has explained how elephant vocalizations travel through the ground for great distances, and how other elephants can understand them, just as they understand acoustic sound, which travels through the air.
Research that led to the development of the content of the podcast was done by Dr Caitlin O’Connell-Rodwell, who is the author of ‘The Elephant’s Secret Sense’.
Early in her research, Dr. O’Connell-Rodwell noticed behavior that indicates elephants are listening to acoustic (airborne) sounds by putting their ears out and orienting toward the sound’s source.
At other times, she also noticed a more puzzling behavior: Several elephants would freeze simultaneously, sometimes in mid-stride, and would press their front feet into the ground.
They might also roll a foot forward so that only their toes touched the ground. At other times, they would lift a front leg.
The behavior reminded the researcher of the behavior she saw in insects that communicate seismically.
She began a series of experiments that eventually found that:
Low-frequency elephant vocalizations, which are below the threshold of human hearing, travel through the ground in the same waveform as they do in the air.
The ground vocalization can travel faster or more slowly than acoustic sound, depending on soil conditions, but has the potential of travelling further as there is no outer limit to how far sounds can travel through the earth.
When she played a recorded elephant vocalization through the ground only, other elephants detected the vocalization.
Elephants understood the ground-borne vocalizations.
For example, they responded appropriately to an alarm call from another elephant by assuming their defensive posture of bunching and freezing.
They also responded only to alarm calls of elephants living in the area rather than those made from elephants elsewhere.
Elephants also have anatomical adaptations to help them ‘hear’ these ground-borne vocalizations.
They have an enlarged malleus, a middle ear bone that plays an important role in hearing.
Animals that communicate seismically often have an enlarged malleus as it also facilitates bone conducted detection of vibrations.
Elephants can close their middle ear canal, forming a closed acoustic tube which enhances bone conduction and blocks out acoustic sound, helping the elephant focus on the vibration pathway.
They have an acoustically designed foot, with a thick fat pad that perhaps helps in the transmission or conduction of vibrations. (ANI)
Purulia (West Bengal), Sep 19 (ANI): An 18-month old elephant calf was found drowned in a pond inside Panchet forest in west Bengal’s Purulia district.
Forest officials said a herd of 22 elephants were moving from Panchet forest to the Dalma forest area when the mishap occurred.
“When they tried to cross the pond the calf drowned and the rest of the herd tried hard to save it in vain and it drowned and died,” said Nilratan Panda, assistant district forest officer at Bishnupur.
Home to 60 percent of Asia’s elephants, India has the highest death rate from human-elephant conflict in the world, with 200-250 people and 100 elephants being killed every year. (ANI)
Jalpaiguri, Sep 5 (ANI): Visit the Dhupjhora Elephant Camp of Gorumara National Park in Jalpaiguri in West Bengal, and one might come face to face with an elephant getting its nails done! The forest department organises a camp for cleaning and decorating the jumbos each year.
The elephants’ are thoroughly scrubbed, nails cut, their teeth brushed, and elaborate chalk designs made on them. Their bodies are even anointed with mustard oil for ‘that extra glow’.
Every day in the morning these elephants are taken to the forest for a safari from the Dhupjhora camp. They are brought back late in the afternoon and then taken to the nearby Murti River for routine cleaning.
The mahouts said that the elephants need to be kept well groomed. Hence they are given these beauty parlour like treatment.
“We feed them well, bathe them. Like in a beauty parlour. Their bodies are scrubbed, nails cut and teeth cleaned,’ said Arun Mandal, a mahout.
The whole process is quite a sight. The tourists are especially amazed seeing the jumbos lying calmly in the river.
“I was very delighted to se how the elephants are bathed in the river. They are then brought out and well fed. They are oiled and decorated and given special care. It was really very nice to see all this,’ said Paresh Choudhary, a tourist. (ANI)
Vankal Village (Gujarat), Sep 1 (ANI): An elephant stood guard near the body of its electrocuted mahout for hours in Vankal village in Gujarat.
The incident took place at Vankal village of Navsari district, when the mahout, Lachhu Kevat, was electrocuted to death while sitting on his elephant, Madhumati.
The rare display of affection and devotion moved the villagers who tried hard to calm the elephant and lower the body down its back.
“The elephant was entering the village but its mahout died of electric shock from a cable. The elephant then entered the village quickly and the villagers saw that its mahout had died and stopped the elephant by giving it food. They then called the officials,” said Bhupendra Nayak, Forest Official.
The villagers could bring down Lachhu Kevat’s body from the elephant’s back only late evening. (ANI)
Jaipur, Aug 30(ANI): Hundreds of school students, animal lovers and wildlife enthusiasts came together on Sunday to stage a mass rally through the streets of Jaipur to highlight the cruel treatment meted out to elephants by their owners and mahouts.
The peace procession follows the death of Naina, a 35-year-old elephant, which ran amok while ferrying a group of tourists on a joyride on August 23 and died a day later.
Naina was carrying the tourists to Amer Fort and suddenly turned aggressive although the tourists managed to escape by jumping down as soon as the Mahout lost control of the elephant.
The animal activists, some of them dressed as elephants, carried the symbolic ‘carcass’ of Naina on their shoulders and an earthen pot with smoke coming out of it like Hindus carry dead bodies to a cremation place for the final ritual.
The ‘carcass’ of Naina was placed on a symbolic pyre for the final ritual to create awareness against elephant cruelty.
“Our message is basically to reduce this violence against the elephants and to treat them as living beings. That’s basically peace, we are not doing any kind of protest. Our main aim is to create awareness and make sure that the animal gets some kind of at least basic care they need in Rajasthan weather, which they actually don’t belong to,” said Arjun, a wildlife activist.
The activists said that no lessons had been learnt since the death of Naina and the uncared elephants were still being used to ferry tourists.
“We basically want that the animal being provided (given) their true basic right to food, shelter and water which is not being provided. On top of that they are being used. When you are generating money out of using an elephant, which is providing you food and revenue, the basic thing you can do is to give the elephant sanitation and healthcare, which we are not providing. Elephants are made to work, cruelly chained and they are beaten up with an Ankush (trident like hook),” said Dr Rina Dey, an animal lover. By Lokendra Singh (ANI)
Jalpaiguri, Aug 28 (ANI): A herd of wild elephants wreaked havoc in a village in Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal.
Around 50 elephants had strayed into the Diana forest region of the district from Assam and caused damage to the crops and the houses in the Angrabasha GP-1 and 2 region of Jalpaiguri.
Fed up with the plundering elephants, the villagers took it upon themselves to chase the animals back towards the forest.
“The animals plundered the whole area. They have damaged the crops and our houses as well,” said Ramesh Chettri, a villager.
Experts claim that massive deforestation, poaching and people encroaching upon forest corridors have forced elephants to move out of their natural habitats in search of food and water.
Home to 60 per cent of Asia’s elephants, India has the highest death rate from human-elephant conflict in the world, with 200-250 people and 100 elephants killed annually.
Habitat fragmentation, poaching of tusked males, and patchy forest law enforcement caused the decline in elephant population, but their numbers have slowly been increasing in the recent past. (ANI)
Washington, August 28 (ANI): A new study has determined that nitrous dioxide, popularly known as ‘laughing gas’, has now become the largest ozone-depleting substance emitted through human activities, and is expected to remain the largest throughout the 21st century.
The study was authored by A.R. Ravishankara, J.S. Daniel and Robert W. Portmann of the NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL) chemical sciences division.
For the first time, this study has evaluated nitrous oxide emissions from human activities in terms of their potential impact on Earth’s ozone layer.
As chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), which have been phased out by international agreement, ebb in the atmosphere, nitrous oxide will remain a significant ozone-destroyer, the study found.
Today, nitrous oxide emissions from human activities are more than twice as high as the next leading ozone-depleting gas.
Nitrous oxide is emitted from natural sources and as a byproduct of agricultural fertilization and other industrial processes.
Calculating the effect on the ozone layer now and in the future, NOAA researchers found that emissions of nitrous oxide from human activities erode the ozone layer and will continue to do so for many decades.
ESRL tracks the thickness of the ozone layer, as well as the burden of ozone-depleting compounds in the atmosphere. It maintains a large portion of the world air sampling and measurement network.
NOAA scientists also conduct fundamental studies of the atmosphere and atmospheric processes to improve understanding of ozone depletion and of the potential for recovery the ozone layer.
“The dramatic reduction in CFCs over the last 20 years is an environmental success story. But manmade nitrous oxide is now the elephant in the room among ozone-depleting substances,” said Ravishankara, lead author of the study and director of the ESRL Chemical Sciences Division in Boulder, Colorado.
The ozone layer serves to shield plants, animals and people from excessive ultraviolet light from the sun.
Thinning of the ozone layer allows more ultraviolet light to reach the Earth’s surface where it can damage crops and aquatic life and harm human health.
Though the role of nitrous oxide in ozone depletion has been known for several decades, the new study is the first to explicitly calculate that role using the same measures that have been applied to CFCs, halons and other chlorine- and bromine-containing ozone-depleting substances.
According to scientists, nitrous oxide is also a greenhouse gas, so reducing its emission from manmade sources would be good for both the ozone layer and climate. (ANI)
Mallapuram (Kerala), Aug 28 (ANI): An elephant, a trained and tamed one that was brought to carry tree logs, turned violent and created havoc for a couple of hours at Elamkulam town in Mallapuram district of Kerala.
In the process, the errant elephant damaged several shops and houses.
After running around for hours in the narrow lanes and streets of the town, the jumbo was finally brought under control with the help of an expert firing a dart of tranquilliser at it to neutralise its violent behaviour.
Reportedly, the 24-year old tusker named Palod Govindan Kutty became agitated due to ill treatment by its mahout and unable to bear such an attitude of its master, it ran amok covering the entire village for nearly nine hours.
According to the villagers, the elephant rampaged the boundary walls of many houses, smashed iron gates and even tossed away the roof covering of a shop.
“At around 10.30 or 11a.m, I heard people shouting. I stepped out of my shop and saw that an elephant was running mad and entering the town area. Firstly it went inside a house where many people started shouting. Soon it left the place and then entered the road. Later it started running all over causing destruction on its way. It entered a nearby school as well,” said Girish, an eyewitness.
Consequently, Wildlife rangers and veterinarians of Kerala’s Forest Department have initiated a probe to ascertain the sudden violent behaviour of elephant. (ANI)
Mudumalai (Tamil Nadu), Aug.24 (ANI): A group of elephants on Monday worshipped Lord Ganesha at a temple in Mudumalai on the occasion of the ongoing 10-day Ganesha festival.
The unique annual ceremony is being conducted by elephants in Mudumalai Tiger sanctuary for last 25 years.
On this special day, more than 22 camp elephants are brought to the tribal Ganesha temple in a lively musical procession. The elephants are all decked up and adorned with particular ornaments.
Once the elephants reach the temple only two elephants enter the temple premises and perform the puja. They kneel down and worship lord Ganesha, followed by other elephants.
Special food is also served to all the elephants on this day.
According to a forest officer, the ceremony is performed only in Mudumalai sanctuary.
“Worship of Lord Ganesha by elephants at Mudumalai is one of the oldest. This ceremony is only performed here and nowhere else in India, as it is one of the oldest sanctuaries for elephants,” said Halan, Range Officer, Mudumalai Tiger Sanctuary.
Hundreds of tourists from different parts of the country and abroad visit the place to witness unique elephant Puja (ceremony) dedicated to lord Ganesha.
“We just came here yesterday. My sister, brother-in law, my mom ..my whole family is here and it is Vinayak Chaturthi (Hindu festival)…first thing we saw here was beautiful herd of elephants with very nice tusks. We are having great time. It is wonderful for us,” said Sandeep, a tourist. By Jehova G(ANI)
Kuala Lumpur, Aug. 24 (ANI): Malaysia’s longest convoy of 213 lorries participated in Vinayagar Chathurthi celebrations on Sunday, marking the birthday of Hindu Lord Ganesha.
The 79.5 kilometres long convoy, which included an elephant to signify the deity, achieved a new feat in the Malaysia Book of Records.
Hundreds of devotees walked beside the lorries, which had been decorated with portraits of the elephant-headed Hindu god, in a procession that began from the Sri Maha Mariamman temple in Kampung Sungai Kayu Ara, the Star Online reports.
The procession stopped briefly at various places, including the Kottu Malai Pillaiyar temple in Jalan Pudu Lama.
Among the devotees at the Kottu Malai temple was J.K. Vassanthi, a school teacher, who has been taking a fast of silence in homage to Lord Ganesha’s birthday for the past 28 years.
Another devotee who came to offer her prayers there was a Chinese woman, who embraced Hinduism three years ago.
“I feel calm and serene in this temple,” said the woman, who only wanted to be known as Adeline.
The 32-year-old fitness trainer said she often prayed at a nearby temple but decided to drop by Kottu Malai after finding out about the festival.
Clerk C. Minatchi, 31, said she had been going to the temple every week for six years since her prayers had been answered.
“My brother had gone into coma after an accident. I prayed to Lord Ganesha and 10 days later, my brother recovered,” she said.
Port company executive C. Kaleappan, 51, said he had been travelling all the way from Penang with his family to celebrate the occasion at Kottu Malai for the past 18 years.
“I feel a special bond with this temple and with the blessings of the Lord, my family is prosperous and healthy,” he said, who came with his wife and three daughters. (ANI)
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