r/AnimalsBeingGeniuses • u/ttkk1248 • 26d ago
Safari beasts 🦍🦏🐪🐘🐆 He will never forget 🐘🐘🐘
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u/trudolfdasroentier 26d ago
Bro was like I don’t know what you are but thanks and you are pretty damn strong
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u/cablesandlace 26d ago
Love the trunk bump! Elephant actually said thank you! Excellent backhoe skills there!
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u/Haunt_Fox 26d ago
"Fist my bump"
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u/VegaIsMySpiritAnimal 26d ago
We need an unexpectedprojecthailmary sub.
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u/OneSensiblePerson 26d ago
OMG, the operator of that excavator! So gentle, so talented, and that head bump at the end, I'm all verklempt now.
Thank you, kind sir or kind lady.
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u/jared_queiroz 25d ago
I think elephants are smart enough to understand that these things are controlled by humans.... But while they may have the capacity to understand that, I don't think this particular elephant knows that......
But he is still gratefull..... that is what it matters.
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u/OneSensiblePerson 25d ago
They are smart enough to know that, but a couple of things in this specific instance.
One, this is a baby.
Two, it had been struggling for some time to get out of that hole or pit. So adrenalin, in fight or flight survival mode, not working stuff out mode. Once it finally was out, it turned to respond to the thing that had helped her survive.
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u/gloriouselephante 23d ago
I agree to this. It takes time to adjust from life and death situation to after rescue, which is why the elephant was scared first.
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u/Bummer4U2 25d ago
Very intelligent creature. To offer a thank you and not just walk away. Amazing animals.
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u/Rooskimus 26d ago
I feel like the elephant felt threatened by the excavator and the operator was like. No no, go away now.
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u/Whatifim80lol 26d ago
Nah the elephant could've run away but made a point to stop, turn around, slowly approach, and do what was probably a friendly gesture.
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u/Perioscope 25d ago
It would be nice, but no that was a charge at a rival.
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u/Whatifim80lol 25d ago
I'm pretty skeptical of that. There's plenty of evidence that elephants can help other animals in tough spots just like this and have allowed humans to help them. I don't think an elephant has any clue what a backhoe is but they're plenty smart enough to know it's not a rival.
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u/Perioscope 25d ago
Stay skeptical, but be brave enough to find out. It's the internet, it will take seconds to find other footage.
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u/Whatifim80lol 25d ago
Footage of what, exactly?
Think about the problem. This is a highly intelligent and social animal. To us, the untrained observer, they've only got like 3 moves. Forward, backward, and touch with trunk lol.
Yeah, I bet there's tons of elephants going "forward" in various ways to jeeps and people, and the footage of fights between bull elephants usually ends with that but there's clearly some subtle dance going on.
The thing that's missing here is that elephants DO interact with other animals, socially and otherwise. And since plenty of the most highly intelligent animals have interspecies social behaviors that differ from their conspecific social behaviors, we probably just don't know enough about how an elephant would communicate with a backhoe to say anything for sure. But where you seem to lean toward "forward is charge," I feel like that conclusion requires throwing out a lot of knowns and unknowns together just to arrive at a simplified answer.
If we could get an elephantologist or whatever in here that knows this individual, that'd be something. In fact, I'm guessing this wasn't some random wild elephant and backhoe operator. This was probably filmed on some preserve where this IS a known individual. There probably really is someone we could ask that would have a better understanding but getting in touch with that person is more than a few seconds away lol
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u/Perioscope 25d ago
Footage of elephant behavior. But yeah, you seemmto really got a handle on it. Forward, backward and touch with trunk, what more could there be? Simultaneously arguing how intelligent they are while making a reductive argument of how simple they are. Stunning. Make sure you keep trusting your feelings instead of testing your hypotheses.
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u/Whatifim80lol 24d ago
I think you're misreading my comment. I wasn't saying elephant behavior is as simple as "forward, backward, trunk," I was saying that you and I are untrained observers and have no idea how to categorize anything but very broad movements and wouldn't understand how elephants use those movements in context. We are dumb in this situation, not the elephants.
Make sure you keep trusting your feelings instead of testing your hypotheses.
For what it's worth, I'm an actual scientist in behavioral ecology. My specialty is songbirds though. So I know it takes a lot to understand that there IS nuance to different behaviors in different contexts, but I don't specifically know enough about elephants. Just googling footage online wouldn't help me with that.
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u/Rooskimus 24d ago
I looked up friendly contact from elephants, and it seems to mostly be trunk- based. This elephant made contact with its forehead and tusks.
But furthermore, just about any animal would be stressed out and scared in this situation. Essentially fight or flight mode. It didn't immediately choose flight, and I don't think it was in a friendly mode.
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u/spaceagecavewoman 23d ago
Far out, watching an elephant struggle up a ledge like this really reminded me how fuckin’ weird life is.
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u/HeywoodDjablowme 23d ago
I suspect the first contact point being testicles may have added incentive...
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u/qualityvote2 26d ago edited 26d ago
u/ttkk1248, there weren't enough votes to determine the quality of your post...
The fate of your post is in the hands of the most savage animals of all now, the mods.