This expands our understanding of how elephants use seismic information, with implications for elephant sensory ecology and conservation management.
We conclude that seismic noise are cues that contain biologically relevant information for elephants that they can associate with risk.
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In particular, we found evidence of retreat behaviour, where seismic tracks with human-generated noise caused elephants to move further away from the trial location. We found evidence of both detection of seismic noise and discrimination between the two treatments containing human-generated noise. We played three types of seismic vibrations to elephants: seismic recordings of elephants (elephant-generated), white noise (human-generated) and a combined track (elephant- and human-generated). To investigate seismic information transfer in elephants beyond communication, here we tested the hypothesis that wild elephants detect and discriminate between seismic vibrations that differ in their noise types, whether elephant- or human-generated. Seismic information is known to include elephant-generated signals, but also potentially encompasses biotic cues that are commonly referred to as ‘noise’. We conclude that seismic rumbles can be used to remotely monitor and even decipher elephant social interactions, presenting us with a tool for far-reaching, non-intrusive and surprisingly informative wildlife monitoring.Īfrican elephants ( Loxodonta africana ) use many sensory modes to gather information about their environment, including the detection of seismic, or ground-based, vibrations.
For our experimental set-up, seismic localization has higher accuracy than acoustic, and bimodal localization does not improve results. In this study, we recorded seismic and co-generated acoustic rumbles in Kenya and compared their potential use to localize the vocalizing animal using the same multi-lateration algorithms. However, it is not well understood how each mode contributes to the animals’ abilities to detect these rumbles and extract behavioural or spatial information. Their low-frequency rumbles propagate through the air as well as through the ground and the physical properties of both media cause differences in frequency filtering and propagation distances of the respective wave. African elephants ( Loxodonta africana ) are sentient and intelligent animals that use a variety of vocalizations to greet, warn or communicate with each other.
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