We recently had the occasion to write an article exploring the question of whether elephant, and other great plains grazers, might be essential to savannah grassland’s ability to sequester carbon. Grasslands are effective carbon sinks. The soil beneath them is even better at storing carbon.
And elephant, it has recently been posited, are essential in the maintenance of grasslands. Through their eating of immature acacia shrubs and small bushes, grazing animals like elephant maintain grassland habitats.
Their dung, largely comprised of plant matter and the carbon sequestered by those plants in life, is easier to break down than is a tree that is decomposing without having passed through an elephant’s gastronomic system. This means that the conversion of plant matter into soil, through the vector of an elephant’s digestion, is a more effective, less carbon-emitting method for creating soil.
With climate change widely considered one of the greatest risks affecting humanity and our various modes of existence, we began to wonder whether this interaction, between elephant and our greatest threat, couldn’t be considered an example of one of the animal world’s interesting symbiotic relationships.
It’s a bit of a stretch but it did get us thinking.
What are the different types of symbiotic relationship?
There are three different types of symbiotic relationship found in the animal kingdom. Mutualism, or mutualistic relationships, benefit both species involved. Commensalism benefits one side of the relationship without harming the other. And parasitic relationships benefit one while the other is harmed.
If we are allowing ourselves the freedom to imagine that our relationship with elephant, as it relates to arresting the affects of climate change, is symbiotic, it probably falls under the category of commensalism.
Even if our elephant as protectors of our planet symbiotic relationship notion is a bit of a stretch, there are a great many, found all over Africa, that are real examples of wildlife’s symbiosis. And they are all interesting in their own right.
The Nile crocodile and the Egyptian plover
The Nile crocodile and the Egyptian plover
This is one of the better known symbiotic relationships found in Africa. The Nile crocodile is found throughout sub-Saharan Africa, in Madagascar and, as the name suggests, in the River Nile. Its natural habitat is rivers, mangrove swamps and freshwater marshes.
The Egyptian plover is the best-known bird in the plover family to have a symbiotic relationship with the Nile crocodile. It’s a wading bird, found near water and the fact that it will hop into the mouths of the Nile crocodile is as well-known as it is awe-inspiring.
Honey guide and the Human being
The honey guide and the human being/honey badger
The honey guide is an incredible bird, and the oft-witnessed behavioural symbiosis it practices with certain humans is one of those stories that reminds the human being that we were once a part of something animal and interactive.
In certain parts of the world, the honey guide, which is a grouping of seventeen different bird species, guides human beings and honey badgers to bees’ nests. Of the seventeen honey guide species, two have been witnessed to practice this behaviour.
After they’ve located the bees’ nest, the honey guide finds a human being and leads him or her to the nest, chirruping and waiting for it’s companion as it leads the way. Once the human, or the honey badger, have eaten their fill of the honey, the honey guide eats the wax and the bee larvae.
This behaviour has been seen in several parts of the world. It has also been lost in others. In the places where this behaviour is still seen, its an incredible example of mutually-beneficial symbiosis. Legend has it, however, that if the human leaves nothing for the honey guide, the bird will lead it’s next followers into a lions den or off a cliff.
Olive baboon and African elephant
There have been recorded examples of behavioural symbiosis between olive baboons and elephant. In dry seasons, when elephant are forced to dig for underground aquifers in order to find water, olive baboons have been witnessed keeping guard for the elephants in exchange for the chance to drink from the elephant’s well.
The elephant, of course, has very few natural predators but elephant herds are still wary and watchful when they have young and lion prides are about.