An elephant at a German zoo has become the subject of a scientific study because of her special skill ... she likes to peel her bananas.
An elephant’s trunk is a remarkable organ: a fusion of nose and upper lip, capable of movement via a dense network of muscles. It’s strong enough to lift a log, and sensitive enough to perform delicate tasks like picking up a single tortilla chip without breaking it. Now a team of researchers in Berlin have documented an elephant using her trunk for another novel behavior: peeling bananas.
When she’s with other elephants and they’re all being fed bananas, Pang Pha will eat “like a machine,” says Brecht, not wasting time by stopping to peel. But in a move that he calls “quite strategic,” when there’s only one banana left, she’ll save it and peel it later. The question of why she peels bananas, and only peels brownish ones, is up in the air — it may have to do with taste, or the ease of peeling bananas in different stages of ripeness.
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