“Does the long trunk of an elephant give it an advantage for a sense of smell? Or is it more designed as a tool for other things?”
Elephants have an acute sense of smell: a 2014 study estimated that it is five times more powerful than human noses, double that of dogs, and even beats the previous animal record-holder: rats. It’s an ability that allows the elephants to avoid enemies and find food and water over long distances.
A new study by researchers from the University of Queensland has also confirmed that African elephants use their keen sense of smell as a form of communication and identification.
Professor Louw Hoffman from UQ’s Queensland Alliance of Agriculture and Food Innovation co-led a study of elephants in wildlife parks in Malawi, testing the DNA, glands, urine and manure from 113 African elephants to identify their family groupings.
The study, published in Scientific Reports, found that chemical profiles from temporal gland, buccal and genital secretions were coded for individual identity and age, and so could be used by other elephants to distinguish characteristics including age, health, reproductive status and family relationships.
They suggest that natural selection could favour flexible group-specific odours that bond a group together even among non-relatives, in addition to possible other markers for genetic connections. They suggest that individuals need to identify ‘in’ and ‘out’ group odours both to avoid inbreeding and to identify recipients for reciprocal behaviour.
The study showed that such group-specific odour does not seem correlated to genetic similarity, but is likely to be a result of shared bacteria – just as was discovered with homesharing housemates here.
