Long-term social memory of elephants

The proverbial elephant memory is no coincidence, as the recent study (Kränzlin et al. 2024 Zoobiology) by the Böhmer Research Group shows. As part of his Bachelor’s thesis under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Christine Böhmer (CAU Kiel), Martin Kränzlin investigated whether zoo elephants can remember their former keepers. The first step was to look for suitable animals. The elephant cows Bibi and Panya were both brought from Berlin Zoo to Hodenhagen 13 years ago, where they now live in the Serengeti Park. Martin Kränzlin then contacted the former animal keepers in Berlin and asked for support with the study. As a total of three different sensory stimuli (olfactory, auditory and visual) were to be tested, the researchers needed an odor sample, a voice sample and a visual sample from the former keepers.

For the two-choice object tests, a known and an unknown sample was placed simultaneously in front of the elephant. The animal was alone and it was free to decide whether it interacted with the experimental set-up or not. The behavior was filmed and the duration of interaction was quantified. The “trunk reach duration”, for example, describes the time the elephant directs the tip of its trunk towards the stimulus. All parameters were statistically evaluated. The results show that familiar stimuli generated greater interest than unfamiliar stimuli. In particular, the elephants tried to reach the T-shirt (odor sample) of the known former keeper more often than the T-shirt of the unknown person. In contrast, there were no significant differences in the sound recordings (voice sample) and the portrait photos (visual sample).

Experimental set-up in the Serengeti-Park in Hodenhagen, Lower Saxony, Germany. (C) Luise Kränzlin/Böhmer Research Group, Kiel University

The results of the study were published in the scientific journal Zoobiology in collaboration with Dr. Idu Azogu-Sepe, Head of Research at Serengeti Park, and the renowned behavioral expert Dr. Emmanuelle Pouydebat from the Centre National de la Recherche (UMR 7179 CNRS/MNHN/FUNEVOL in Paris, France).

Press release: https://www.uni-kiel.de/en/details/news/160-elephants

Reference:

Kränzlin M*, Azogu-Sepe I, Pouydebat E, Böhmer C (2024) Do African Savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana) show interspecific social long-term memory for their zoo keepers. Zoobiology DOI: 10.1002/zoo.21871