Social standing influences elephant movement

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A family of elephants leaves a river in Samburu National Reserve upon the arrival of a more dominant elephant family. Monsoon the matriarch (third from the right in foreground) in the more dominant family is equipped with a GPS radio collar allowing  ...
A family of elephants leaves a river in Samburu National Reserve upon the arrival of a more dominant elephant family. Monsoon, the matriarch (third from the right in foreground) in the more dominant family, is equipped with a GPS radio collar, allowing researchers to track her movements. Credit: Photo by George Wittemyer, UC Berkeley

When resources are scarce, who you know and where you're positioned on the social totem pole affects how far you'll go to search for food. At least that's the case with African elephants, according to a study led by ecologists at the University of California, Berkeley, who collaborated with researchers at Save the Elephants, a non-profit research organization based in Kenya, and at the University of Oxford in England.


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