Shower Taking and Interfering Elephants

Most people consider humans the pinnacle of creation, capable of reasoning and tool use in ways that animals cannot. However, as research has progressed, this distinction has narrowed, and it is now known that, for instance, chimpanzees can use sticks as tools and New Caledonian crows can even craft them.

This is why it was particularly fascinating to read a recent study by German researcher Lea Urban and her colleagues on elephant behavior. These giant animals are already known to use and modify tools.

Urban and her team investigated how Asian zoo elephants use water hoses as tools. The flexibility, length, and water flow of hoses make them exceptionally complex tools, so it was not surprising that the researchers observed significant individual differences in how they were handled.

One female elephant, Mary, was particularly skilled at using the water hose. She systematically used it to shower her body and smoothly coordinated her trunk-holding movements with her other limbs.

Mary typically grasped the hose just behind the tip, allowing it to function as a rigid showerhead. However, when she wanted to reach her back, she grabbed the hose farther from the tip and swung it over her back, utilizing the hose's flexibility and ballistics.

Even more intriguing was that a younger female elephant, Anchali, began interfering with the hose while Mary was enjoying her shower. Anchali started pulling the hose toward herself, lifting and bending it, and then regrasping and compressing the bent section.

This bending-and-clamping behavior disrupted the water flow, and Anchali repeated it frequently. Over time, her ability to disrupt the water flow became more effective. Additionally, Anchali pressed the hose down with her trunk, further hindering the flow of water.

The researchers could not determine whether Anchali’s actions were specifically aimed at disrupting Mary’s shower or whether her behavior was independent of it. Nevertheless, the study demonstrated that elephants are capable of handling water hoses skillfully and even using them as tools.

Previous thoughts on the same topic:
Games and Midsummer games
The amazing adventures of the German cockroach
Leaders infected by a parasite

Games and Midsummer games

Young mammals are often playful, as anyone who has interacted with a kitten or puppy knows. This is no coincidence, as play teaches them skills needed later in life, such as hunting or intra-species confrontations for defending territories or during mating season.

A recent study analyzed the behavior of Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins in Western Australia. Observations were available from as early as 1982, making it possible to compare the events of their adult lives with their childhood.

Researchers found that young male dolphins engaged in play resembling adult reproductive behavior, such as forming alliances with other males to herd females and producing specific vocalizations in the presence of the opposite sex.

Paternity data from eleven male dolphins, on the other hand, showed that their later reproductive success was quite well predicted by the time they spent as young dolphins participating in social play that resembled adult male sexual behavior. In other words, they demonstrated the benefits of play in the development of sexual behavior in wild animal populations.

I decided to publish this text on the morning of Midsummer Day, as I assumed some of my esteemed readers might have participated in Midsummer's traditional rituals, which are believed to have magical effects on one's romantic life. Not because I think they somehow correspond to the adult-mimicking play of young dolphins, but because both are related to the most important task in an individual's life for the survival of the species: reproduction.

And perhaps something has happened on this Midsummer night that will be reflected in national statistics nine months from now?

Previous thoughts on the same topic:
The amazing adventures of the German cockroach
World oceans are filled with previously unknown viruses
Seeing sex developed novel cultures