On December 27, 2010 on 60 Minutes, there was a segment repeat on elephants and communication (which can be found here).The show examines the research methods for both naturalistic observation as well as analysis of the various frequencies of sounds. As it turns out, elephants can create sounds that are below the level of human hearing which is about 20 Hertz. The researcher has a wonderful explanation the process of how this was discovered.
The context of this for me is a demonstration of how there are visual and auditory frequencies that we cannot detect. More on this topic later.
Here are some other sites that examine both the elephant communication system and infrasound.
The Elephant Listening Project
History/Overview of Infrasound on Wikipedia
posted by Chuck Schallhorn
You may be interested to know about my new book, ELEPHANT TALK, which presents this science for readers grades 7 and up. Lerner's eSource page for the book has a Google Earth Tour teachers can play on a Smartboard, with links to video about elephant communication around the world. Also great video up on the NOVA website about an elephant orchestra in Thailand.
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