Amazon.co.uk Review
Naturalist and bioacoustics researcher Katy Payne stood near an elephant cage at a zoo and felt a strange "throb and flutter" in the air. When she later realized that the feeling was very like that caused by the lowest notes of a pipe organ, she embarked on a journey of scientific and personal discovery that took her to Africa to study how the huge mammals communicate. For years, she lived close to the elephants she loved, getting to know individuals and describing their long-distance infrasound "conversations". After her fifth such expedition, one third of the elephant population she was studying was killed in a planned cull by the Zimbabwean government. Whether or not you accept Payne's hypothesis that elephants are extraordinarily intelligent and capable of communicating with each other and with other species (including humans), you will find her descriptions of the animals compelling and compassionate. Her grief at the loss of her elephant friends is palpable, and she uses it to utmost effect in decrying not only the ivory trade, but the way in which humans have decided to live on the planet. --
Therese Littleton
Product Description
The scientist who observed elephants for 10 years reveals how they communicate. Kate Payne spent a decadewith her husband observing sperm whales but after her separation from her husband she turned to the elephant , the largest land animal. The elephant's social hierarchy, mating habits and relationships have often been observed and written about, but what is the explanation behind the sensitive awareness showed by elephants within their own particluar tribes? Kate Payne tells how on one occasion a group of elephants she was observing appeared restless. They looked around them, as if searching for someone missing. in the horizon an elephant approached, arrioved and they all went off to the water hole together. Her book became a study of elephant life generally. What began as idle curiosity in American zoos became an obsession in the African veld. There she saw at 1st hand, elephants at ease, elephants fighting each other and elephants being hunted.
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