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Researchers from Myanmar, Finland and the UK recently found that having older sisters has a significant positive impact on elephants.
In this study, researchers examined the long-term effects of siblings on young calves as part of a supervised working group of Asian elephants from Myanmar Timber Enterprise (MTE). Longitudinal studies in long-lived animals are generally not feasible because research institutions do not have the resources to conduct decades of research. However, MTE carefully tracks and records information about the lives of its elephants.
MTE elephants are free to roam, mingle with groups of wild elephants. This allows the researchers to speculate that the results of their studies on MTE elephants may be more applicable to all species.
The researchers concluded that animal kinship is especially important within community-oriented and social groups of mammals, such as elephants, after using this data to study elephant family ties.
The important influence of the elephant siblings
In female elephants, having an older sister correlates with longer average life expectancy, higher survival rates, and higher reproductive rates. All of these factors are also important in determining the quality of life of an elephant. These factors are also important for the conservation of Asian elephants.
The older brothers also had a positive impact on the young calves. However, the influence was not as strong as that of the older sisters. Reproduction was one of the highest rates of positive impact. Elephants with older sisters began to breed at least two years earlier than with older brothers.
For male elephants, older sisters did not necessarily correlate with longer lifespan or better survival rates. However, this did correlate with higher average body weight. This is another important indicator of later survival. Higher average body weight lowers the risks for the elephant to survive later in life.
The relationship between siblings has a large impact on the cognitive development of calves. A high level of cooperative behavior is essential for survival, especially within social species. Elephants are one of the best representatives of the social species. This is due to their important family ties.
The future of sibling research
The researchers recognized the limitations of this study and the potential impact of external factors on survival and reproducibility.
In the future, the research team plans to conduct research on the weight of maternal elephants, the environmental factors of the family group, and the impact of the presence of young calves on older elephants.
We hope that through further study of elephant family relationships, researchers will be able to gather more information about the community and family ties of this intelligent animal.
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