Elephants Choose Their Food: New Research Reveals Individual Variation and Preferences

Elephants are the largest and heaviest land animals on Earth, with three living species: the African savanna elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant.

They play important roles in ecosystems, such as dispersing seeds, creating habitats, and modifying landscapes.

However, elephants do not eat the same thing for dinner every night. Elephants vary their diet depending on the availability and quality of food sources, as well as their own preferences and physiological needs.

They also adjust their diet to cope with environmental changes, such as seasons, weather, or human activities.

The consequences of dietary diversity for elephants

(Photo : Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images for The Animal Ball)

Dietary diversity is the degree of variation in the types and amounts of food consumed by an individual or a population. Dietary diversity is important for elephants for several reasons:

Nutrition

Dietary diversity can provide elephants with a balanced intake of nutrients, such as carbohydrates, proteins, fats, vitamins, minerals, and water.

Different types of plants have different nutritional values and compositions, which can affect the growth, development, reproduction, and health of elephants.

For example, grasses are high in fiber but low in protein; fruits are high in sugar but low in minerals; roots are high in starch but low in vitamins.

Adaptation

Dietary diversity can help elephants adapt to environmental changes, such as seasonal fluctuations, climatic variations, or human disturbances.

Different types of plants have different responses and availability to these changes, which can affect the food supply and quality for elephants.

Preference

Dietary diversity can reflect the preferences and tastes of elephants, which can vary among individuals or populations.

Preferences can be influenced by genetic factors, learning experiences, social influences, or physiological states.

For example, some elephants may prefer certain plant species or parts over others; some elephants may learn from their mothers or peers what to eat; some elephants may change their diet during pregnancy or lactation.

Dietary diversity can have various benefits for elephants, such as enhancing their nutrition, adaptation, and preference, as per Phys.org.

However, dietary diversity can also have some costs, such as increasing their foraging time, energy expenditure, or exposure to predators, parasites, or toxins.

Therefore, elephants have to balance the trade-offs between the benefits and costs of dietary diversity and optimize their diet according to their needs and environmental conditions.

Also Read: Free Mali: The World's Loneliest Elephant Locked Away in a Philippine Zoo for Almost 40 Years

The findings of the new study

A new study published in the journal Royal Society Open Science has found that similar to humans, elephants also vary what they eat for dinner every night, as per DailyMail.

The study was led by scientists from Brown University who used a novel genetic technique to analyze the dietary habits of two groups of elephants in Kenya.

The technique is called DNA metabarcoding, which involves analyzing biological samples such as hair or feces and matching the extracted DNA fragments representing an elephant's food to a library of plant DNA barcodes.

Brown University has been developing applications for this technology, and bringing together researchers from molecular biology and the computational side to solve problems faced by conservationists in the field.

The researchers collected fecal samples from two groups of elephants living in different habitats: one group in savanna woodland and one group in montane forest.

They used DNA metabarcoding to identify the plant species and estimate the proportions of each plant type in each sample.

The researchers found that both groups of elephants consumed a diverse range of plants, including grasses, shrubs, trees, and herbs.

They also found that each individual elephant had a unique diet composition, even among family members that foraged together, and detected up to 137 unique plant DNA barcodes in one fecal sample revealing the true extent of variation in an individual's diet.

Furthermore, they found that the diet composition of elephants varied across seasons, months, and days, reflecting the changes in plant availability and quality due to rainfall, temperature, or human activities.

They also found that the diet composition of elephants varied according to their sex, age, and reproductive status, reflecting the differences in nutritional requirements and physiological needs among elephants.

The researchers concluded that elephants vary what they eat for dinner every night based on the availability and quality of food sources, as well as their own preferences and physiological needs.

Dietary diversity is important for the health and survival of elephants in a changing environment, according to the study.

With all of these, the researchers recommended that managers should monitor and protect the habitats and food sources of elephants, especially during the dry season or periods of drought; and that more studies should be conducted on the effects of dietary diversity on the physiology and behavior of elephants.

Meanwhile, educators should raise public awareness and understanding of the dietary habits and needs of elephants.