Female elephants more choosy about mates, says study

 If you thought human beings were choosy when it came to their mate, a recent study shows that female elephants are even more so.

The study was conducted by noted elephant experts Raman Sukumar and Prof Karpagam Chelliah from the Centre of Ecological Sciences at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc).

According to Sukumar, this is a first of its kind study in the world. The study shows that tusks do not matter to females elephants when choosing their mate, breaking the age old notion that tusks play a vital role. The large body, height, weight, age of the tusker, robust looks and musth duration are what matter. Interestingly, older males gain more popularity among young females.

The study was conducted in Kaziranga, Assam, for a duration of three years, where about 40 per cent of male elephants are tusked. The findings are true of elephants in the South Indian states where about 90 per cent of the males are tusked and in Sri Lanka where about 10 per cent of the males are tusked. But the same is not applicable to African nations as almost all male elephants there are tusked.

The tusks are gradually losing importance in Karnataka and other South Indian states. “This is a good surprising behavioural change in cow elephants. One of the reasons for this could be that many males have lost their tusks in the past because of poaching and the females have started to accept it gradually. It has been a dynamic process. It also shows that tusks are gradually being looked at as a symbol to fight and guard the females. Tusks are on the way out in some sense and elephants have stopped giving importance to them. Same is the case with the deer, where Antlers are loosing their charm in choosing the right partner,” Sukumar said.

This study is now being compared by researchers globally to assess similar behaviour of pachyderms in their regions. The study focused on three mating factors – presence of tusks, body size and musth. It showed that the females play a dominant role during the mating course, like chasing the male, allowing to mate and then refusing. Though musth continues to dominate in males, some females  even indulged with younger sneaky males when a dominant male showed slack behaviour while guarding her. While some females did not mind if the male mounting her was over 30- 50 percent heavier than her, many refused the males during the mounting period.