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sumpuran t1_j6fz26m wrote

I knew about the three species of elephant but TIL about linking to a specific line of text in a Wikipedia article!

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MitsyEyedMourning t1_j6fzpe0 wrote

That's what The Man does, tries to separate us and break us down.

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dazedan_confused t1_j6g4mge wrote

I heard if you trim the bush, you can make the elephant look bigger.

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Dandibear t1_j6g6qou wrote

>Among African elephants, forest elephants have smaller and more rounded ears and thinner and straighter tusks than bush elephants and are limited in range to the forested areas of western and Central Africa.

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FastWalkingShortGuy t1_j6g8ewo wrote

There's a significant breakdown of communication between Forest and Bush African elephants:

"Stupid is as stupid does."

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on... we, uh, we can't get fooled again."

These mating calls mean the same thing, but the Forest and the Bush can't understand each other.

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Obi_Uno t1_j6g9c3b wrote

Somebody just listen to Stuff You Should Know?

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Ok-disaster2022 t1_j6gr8yy wrote

Are we sure they're not subspecies? To me, so long as members of each subspecies can produce genetically viable offspring, they're still subspecies. I don't think it should matter if there's distinguishing features or geographic reasons why the two groups don't mate, the defining characteristic has got to be genetic. So wolves and dogs are subspecies that haven't fully diverged yet, but lions and tigers or horses and donkeys are clearly different species.

Biologists like to name species or whatever, and biology is rife with bad toxonomy and organisation because it doesn't want to rely on objective measurement that can undermine the accomplishments of leaders in the field. And that's bad science. If science achievements can only progress one funeral at a time, then the scientific achievement is broken.

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SphericalBitch2020 t1_j6gxiz7 wrote

Colonel Hathi's Song playing in the background. Love it! OK, I know it's India, but I just love this all-time Walt Disney favourite from The Jungle Book.

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Frogloggers t1_j6h1lc2 wrote

Replying to Ok-disaster2022 (#1,604,070)

> To me, so long as members of each subspecies can produce genetically viable offspring, they're still subspecies.

This definition of a species doesn't really work in practice. There exists species (or in your view populations), let's call them species B, that are able to produce viable offspring with both species A and C. However, species A and C cannot produce viable offspring as the genetic distance is just too much.

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moistdepth69 t1_j6h60jp wrote

Every new time I listen to a new SYSK episode I see these facts the day after.

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CryptidGrimnoir t1_j6hkr12 wrote

Replying to Ok-disaster2022 (#1,604,070)

Wolves and coyotes are classified as separate species, but they can produce fertile offspring.

And among Panthera hybrids--ligers, tigons, etc.--the females are fertile.

It's rare, but mules are capable of breeding as well.

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Perpetual_Doubt t1_j6k8ck7 wrote

Utterly sucks to see the Forest elephant is listed as critically endangered

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