There was a 6o Minutes program tonight about elephants communicating. Researchers from Cornell University are working on the Elephant Listening Project (ELP), and have been able to learn a lot about elephant vocalizations: Link
quote:
Elephant communication involves not only sound but also vision and especially olfaction (smell). Elephants can also sense detailed patterns in seismic signals (vibrations in the ground), but we don't have enough information to know whether this modality is used to exchange information between individuals.
Each of these sensory modalities is used to decode often separate, but overlapping, messages. And one modality might be used to modify the message carried by another modality, just as the human vocal communication 'What did you say?' carries a different meaning if the speaker's eyebrows are raised and eyes are wide than if the speaker has lowered eyebrows and narrowed, threatening, eyes. Elephants often use physical gestures and olfactory signals in combination with vocalizations to communicate.
They actually are in the process of writing an elephant dictionary.
[/QUOTE]They actually are in the process of writing an elephant dictionary.[/QUOTE]
I don't see how such a dictionary would consist of anything more than "this sound is used when elephants come together". In fact this was the only concrete example of an elephant "message" I could find on the Elephant Listening Project site.
Well, on the 60 Minutes show there were many more examples than that, but generally you are correct. It all seemed odd to me. After all, you know when dogs or cats are happy or when they're in distress or about to mate, which are the sorts of sounds they mentioned. I am not sure how elephants are different from other animals.
It was interesting, though, that some of the vocalizations of elephants aren't audible by human ears. They are trying to decipher what those sounds mean.
The zoo elephant house is next to a little used train track. Occasional freights pass their abode and, when it first happened, the elephants turned toward the approaching train, flapped their ears, raised their trunks, and made the most horrendous nosie. It was like standing next to a bass amplifier with volume turned to ten. The entire area vibrated, which I at first attributed to the train, but which continued even after the train disappeared.
