(What Are Animals Thinking? They Feel Empathy, Grieve, Seek Joy Just Like Us.)
“This photograph works on so many levels,” said competition chair Kathy Moran in a press release. “Emotionally it’s a gut punch, heartbreakingly poignant. Intellectually it’s proof that animals have cognition. This photograph says it all!”
Both African and Asian elephants have complex behaviors in response to death, including evidence of relatives and non-relatives guarding, carrying, and inspecting the dead in a way that has led scientists to wonder if these behaviors are mourning rituals. “There is a lot going on in them trying to make sense of death, in a way, and this baby was certainly part of that relationship,” says Veronesi.
After he captured this shot, Veronesi watched the female elephant carry the calf up a rocky hill, occasionally setting it down just to feed on a small bush before gathering it up again. Curiously, the elephant didn’t look like she’d recently given birth, so he contacted a local elephant research project to find out more. The researchers said this female had lost a baby a few years earlier and has since been seen picking up other dead calves. “It’s probably a way for her to try to reconnect to that experience in a way,” says Veronesi. “It shows an even higher level of complexity of emotions and reactions.”
