Bees could help protect elephants

Source: The Press Association

Date: 13 October 2007

Author: Anon

Hives of angry bees could provide a low-tech way of protecting endangered African elephants, scientists said.

Researchers found many elephants fled immediately on hearing the sound of the buzz of bees but ignored a control recording of natural white-noise.

The findings appear to support the idea that bees may help to prevent elephants from coming into contact with humans who are increasingly encroaching on former wildlife areas. As a result, African elephants have been squeezed into ever smaller spaces and risk being shot if they stray on to farms or agricultural land.

Lucy King, from the Department of Zoology at Oxford University and one of the authors of the study, said: "We weren't surprised that they responded to the threatening sound of disturbed bees as elephants are intelligent animals that are intimately aware of their surroundings, but we were surprised at how quickly they responded to the sounds by running away. Almost half of our study herds started to move away within 10 seconds of the bee playback."

Earlier studies had suggested elephants prefer to steer clear of bees. One report showed that elephant damage to acacia trees hosting occupied or empty beehives was significantly less than in trees without hives, the researchers said.

In Zimbabwe, scientists have also reported seeing elephants forging new trails in an effort to avoid beehives.

In the new study, published in Current Biology, researchers looked at the response of several well-known elephant families in Kenya to the digitally recorded buzz of disturbed African bees.

Sixteen of the 17 families tested left their resting places under trees within 80 seconds of hearing the bee sound, the researchers reported, and half responded within just 10 seconds. Among elephants hearing the control sounds, none had moved after 10 seconds and only four families had moved after 80 seconds.

By the end of the four-minute playback of the sounds of bees buzzing, only one elephant family had failed to move compared to eight families who stayed where they were on hearing the sound of natural white noise.

Ms King said the research showed farmers and conservation managers across Kenya may be able to use bees as a valuable elephant deterrent and avoid the need to resort to extreme solutions such as shooting problem animals. "If we could use bees to reduce elephant crop raiding and tree destruction while at the same time enhancing local income through the sale of honey, this could be a significant and valuable step towards sustainable human-elephant coexistence," she said.