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Self taught peeling of banana offers broader abilities of elephants:
In this research report , elephant was seen Peeling the bananas in the same way as humans do.
A latest research report published in the journal current biology on 10th of April had proved it that elephants also like to eat bananas in the same way as humans do, but their way of peeling them is totally different than humans. This research was conducted on an Asian origin elephant named pang pha. The elephant was living in the Berlin Zoo. She dedicates it to bananas that are golden brown, break the bananas in half first before shaking and removing the pulp, leaving a thick skin.
According to authors report, this unusual Peeling of the bananas by this female elephant came actually by watching her caretakers. we therefore observed that the elephants have special cognitive and manipulative abilities.
According to words of Michael Brecht of Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin's Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience.
"We have discovered a very unique behavior of elephants". “What makes Pang Pha's way of peeling the bananas so unique is the combination of many factors - skill, speed, individuality and presumed human origin - rather than a single behavioral factor. odd."
Furthermore , Like other elephants, Pha eats either green or yellow bananas. She flatly refused brown bananas. But when it comes to brown speckled yellow bananas — the kind you might go for banana bread — she eats them after peeling.
Among other colleagues of
Brecht includes Lena Kaufmann, also at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Andreas Ochs, Berlin Zoological Garden, made the report after gaining knowledge from elephant Pha's caretakers about her unusual way of peeling the banana. They were confused in the beginning. According to their reports, they brought Pha nice yellow and green bananas, and she never peeled them.
According to Brecht, It was only when we realized that she was only peeling yellow-brown bananas that our project was successful.
pha was seen to change behavior when Yellow-brown bananas were offered to group of elephants. She Started eating as much bananas as she can and in the last she saved one among them in order to peel it later.
As far as is known, banana peeling seems to be very rare in elephants and no other Berlin elephant participates in peeling. We don't know why Pha peeled them off. However, the researchers note that she was hand-raised by human keepers at the Berlin Zoo. They never taught him how to peel a banana, but they fed him peeled bananas.
According to researchers, the method of peeling she holds is actually through learning from caretakers. Previous reports on African Elephants show that elephants can interpret human hand gestures and classify people into ethnic groups, but complex man-made processing behaviors such as peeling the bananas seems quite unique, according to the researchers. However, Pha's results suggest that elephants generally have surprising cognitive abilities and impressive manipulation abilities.
According to Brecht, “Elephants have a truly remarkable proboscis ability, and their behavior is shaped by experience".
The researchers were surprised when Pha alone discovered the banana peel. This led them to wonder whether such habits are often passed down through families of elephants. They are currently investigating other subtle trunk behaviors, such as tool usage.
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