Elephant conservation news 13 February - 19 February 2010
New experiments to test the mental abilities of wild elephants have revealed that the giant mammals can distinguish between individuals based on their 'voice'.
The discovery has come among a barrage of tests on the proverbially intelligent mammals, performed at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya, BBC News reports.
Researchers from the University of Sussex used a 4x4 laden with speakers to play back the "contact rumble" - a greeting message that can be heard across several miles - to different family groups.
The results suggested that matriarchs could learn the identity of upwards of 100 other elephants from hearing the voice alone.
Meanwhile, other tests teased out the mental processing powers of pachyderms, using scents they encounter in nature to provide clues to the workings of their minds.
Dick Byrne, professor of evolutionary psychology at St Andrew's University, who has previously studied the cognitive ability of primates, said elephants show skills that only the great apes and humans have previously displayed.
He pointed to other studies carried out with zoo elephants in Japan, which concluded that they were better at counting than human children. However, he underlined the extent to which the animals remained mysterious to humans.
"We are a bit limited by how little we know about elephants, but the odd glimmers we get seem to be rather remarkable," Professor Byrne added.
Valentine's Day baby for San Diego Zoo
Loud trumpeting hailed the birth of the newest addition to the African elephant herd at San Diego Zoo, after a male calf was born on Valentine's Day.
Weighing a not inconsiderable 16 stones, the currently-unnamed baby boy was nevertheless born a little early, and zookeepers had not yet established a round-the-clock watch, the Los Angeles Times reports.
They were alerted by people camping out under the zoo's 'Snore and Roar' programme, who heard the trumpeting of joy in the early morning as mother Ndlula gave birth.
The infant is the sixth calf born to the herd, which came from Swaziland in 2003.
Melbourne Zoo's baby to be named
Newspaper readers are to vote on the name for Melbourne Zoo's month-old baby elephant, who made her first public appearance last week.
The Herald Sun is giving readers a choice of five names of flowers, picked from a list drawn up to reflect the animal's "playful and adventurous personality".
These include delicate and exotic-sounding names such as Leelawadee and Su Ma Lee, though one commenter on the story suggested something more appropriate for an "Aussie elephant" - Nellie Melba.
