Title: Unravelling ceremonial calf burials among Asian elephants in Northeast India
Parveen Kaswan1 and Akashdeep Roy2*
1 West Bengal Forest Department, Indian Forest Service, India
2 Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune, Maharashtra, India
* Contact information: Akashdeep Roy, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune, Maharashtra-411008, India, +91-8802634741, akashdeep.roy@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Abstract
Rampant environmental change and forest destruction push elephants, both Asian and African, to explore human spaces to fulfil their dietary and ecological requirements. Many ‘novel’ elephant behaviour in sharing spaces come to the limelight. Elephant calf burial is reported in African literature but remains absent from the Asian context. We concretely report calf burials by Asian elephants in the eastern Himalayan floodplains of the north Bengal landscape. The study area consists of fragmented forests, tea gardens, agricultural lands, and defence establishments, among others. Tea gardens form the majority of elephant corridors, and we explain the burial strategy of elephants in the trenches of tea gardens. We present four case reports of calf burials by elephants. We aimed to understand the perimortem strategy and postmortem behaviour of Asian elephants. The major findings reflect that the carcasses were carried through trunks and legs for a distance before burying in a ‘legs-upright-position’. We further investigated the underlying reason for calf deaths through postmortem examinations. Direct human intervention was not recorded in any of the four deaths. Through opportunistic observation, digital photography and fieldnotes, and postmortem examination report, we suggest that the carcasses were buried in an abnormal recumbent style irrespective of the reason for calf deaths. Through long-term observation, we further report that the elephants in this region clearly avoid the paths where carcasses were buried, attributing to “bad milestones” and “bad omens”. We discuss and connect the literature of two distinct elephant species and also compared thanatological studies of other sentient nonhuman species.
Keywords: Thanatology, animal behaviour, Asian elephant, calf burial, eastern Himalayas, tea gardens
To 24/July/2023
The Editor-in-Chief,
Ecology and Evolution
John Wiley and Sons
Subject: Submission of Manuscript
Dear Professor,
I wish to submit a manuscript titled “Unravelling ceremonial calf burials among Asian elephants in Northeast India” to your esteemed journal for publication. Our manuscript presents four case reports of elephant calf burials by herd members in the North Bengal landscape of India. The pre-built trenches in tea gardens provide appropriate space for burying the carcasses. The ‘calf burial’ behaviour has been scarcely studied among African elephants and has not been reported concretely from Asia. We aimed to understand the perimortem strategy and postmortem behaviour of Asian elephants. The major findings reflect that the carcasses were carried through trunks and legs for a distance before being buried in a ‘legs-upright-position’ – showing the adaptive significance and sentient behavioural patterns. To further understand if these deaths would trigger human-elephant conflict in the region, we investigated the underlying reason for calf deaths through postmortem examinations and triangulated the findings through long-term observation. We report that the elephants in this region avoid the paths where carcasses were buried, attributing to “bad milestones” and “bad omens”.
This thanatological work is novel and highlights the evolutionary process compared to African elephants and primates. Neither this research work nor any part of this research has been published or submitted elsewhere for possible publication. I will greatly appreciate a constructive manuscript review with comments and suggestions.
Yours sincerely
Akashdeep Roy
Department of Humanities and Social Sciences
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune
Pashan, Pune, Maharashtra-411008, India
Email: akashdeep.roy@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Mobile: +91-8802634741