Tool-using: request for information

Melissa Groo, who runs the excellent Save the Elephants Elephant News (you can subscribe here), posted the announcement below from Hezy Shoshani, old friend of Amboseli researchers and venerable elephant expert.

REQUEST FOR INFORMATION ON ELEPHANT BEHAVIOR

My colleagues and I have been compiling the available data, information, and observations (published and unpublished) on elephant behaviors that indicate cognitive thinking processes beyond innate or programmed behaviors. We have collected much information and we are preparing a paper for publication incorporating these observations together with the accumulated knowledge of elephant brain. We are also trying to understand, in an evolutionary perspective, what physical and social attributes are required to make a tool.

Before submitting our paper we thought that we might have missed some published material and there might be readers who would be willing to share observations to augment our knowledge on elephant behavior. We ask readers to please send us any observations related to tool using and/or tool making in elephants. Please note that we already have collected many references on these topics {e.g., Chevalier-Skolnikoff, S. & Liska, J. [1993, Animal Behaviour, 46(2): 209-219], Hart, B.L. and colleagues [1994, 2001, 2002, in press, Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews], and Poole, J. H. [1998, Etica & Animali, 9:85-110]}, but it would not hurt to send references, just in case we did not see them.

More importantly, we ask you to send us your unpublished observations of elephant tool using and/or tool making (if you have photos, that is even better). Depending on the content of your observations, we can either acknowledge your help, or should you feel that your contribution warrants co-authorship, we will evaluate the content of your contribution and discuss the options. Below are the information/data we request:

Brief description of the observation, location (as accurate as possible, with GPS if available), date, gender (F, M) and age (young, adult, sub-adult) of the elephant, place of observation -- captivity (C) or in the wild (W), and source (complete reference) or date, for unpublished observations. I provide below four examples.

• Example 1 -- Asian, ?, ?, Sad, Ad, DESCRIPTION: Uses planks and branches to place under feet to prevent from sinking in the mud. SOURCE: Sanderson (1962).
  FOOTNOTE: "Several people have related that Abu [elephant(s)] are bogged in mud or quicksand [they] will save themselves, if planks are thrown to them, by first making a catwalk, climbing on this, and then taking the boards one at a time from behind and placing them in front, and so moving on to safety" (Sanderson, 1962, p. 291).
• Example 2 -- Asian, C, M, Ad, DESCRIPTION: Elephant fails to obey command to lower pillar into a hole until a sleeping dog in the hole is chased away, possibly to avoid hurting the dog. SOURCE: Pillai (1941).
  FOOTNOTE: None.
• Example 3 -- Asian, W, F, Yg, Sad, Ad, DESCRIPTION: Modify branches to make leech scrapers, body scratches, and to chase away flies. SOURCE: Peal (1879).
  FOOTNOTE: Peal (1879, p. 34) observed in eastern Assam a young Asian elephant modify a bamboo branch to make a "leech-scraper", and a female Asian elephant modify branch to make a fan and/or a flyswatter. "Say what we may, these are both really bona fide implements, each intelligently made for a definite purpose" (p. 34).
• Example 4 -- Asian & African, W & C, ?, Sad, Ad, DESCRIPTION: Modify branches by shortening them or by removing side branches for a purpose -- to drive away flies. SOURCE: Hart & Hart (1994), Hart et al. (2001, 2002); Braden (2003, attributed to I. Douglas-Hamilton and/or J. Poole).
  FOOTNOTE: "In addition to the two types of manipulative tool use previously observed in both wild and captive Asian elephants, namely scratching parts of the body with a stick and throwing objects at other animals or people, we can now add fly switching with branches" (from Hart et al., 2001, p. 845). Braden, 2003, pp. 32-38) noted that elephants use sticks to scratch where they cannot reach with trunk.

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Kindly send information to: Jeheskel Shoshani at: hezy23©gmail.com Thank you.