Скачать или смотреть Why Africans and Asian Elephants Smell Differently To Find Food?

A new study in Ecology and Evolution compared African savanna elephants with their Asian cousins. Both rely on smell to find food, but in very different ways.

Savanna elephants could detect plant odors at lower concentrations than Asian elephants. Yet, when a strong background odor was added, their sensitivity collapsed. Asian elephants, however, carried on unbothered.

Why? Scientists say it’s all about habitat. Savanna elephants roam open plains where scents carry far but are less cluttered. Asian elephants, meanwhile, forage in dense forests, navigating through a storm of competing smells.

This study shows how evolution fine-tunes even a sense as simple as smell—helping elephants survive in the worlds they call home.