In several cartoons, the mice frightened the elephants so much that the stereotype about this was fixed in mass culture. We checked how animated reality correlates with reality.
The stereotype that a tiny rodent can easily frighten a huge elephant, is consolidated largely due to mass culture. In the classic Disney cartoon "Dambo", published in 1941, a whole group of elephants Run away In different directions, barely seeing Timothy's mouse. In 1960, the Goliath II short film was released about a naughty elephant, where the scene from Dambo was practically copied. However, the animators are very selective in how to show the “relations” of elephants and mice - they may well even be friends, as, for example, in one from the series "Mickey Mouse" or episode "Tom and Jerry."
Probably, the roots of prejudice about a special relationship between elephants and mice go into antiquity. Pliny Senior in his "natural history" He wrote: "From all animals, the elephants hate mice most of all and, if they see that the mouse touched the food in their stall, they refuse it with disgust." As it is easy to notice, it is not at all about fright here, but about a completely different feeling - disgust. Some sources indicate that the stereotype comes from the Greek fable about how the mouse climbed into the elephant into the trunk, which seriously scared it. However, we could not find such a fable. Perhaps the authors of this statement mean fable Aesopa “Rat and Elephant”, but in this text nothing like this is said.
In 2007, the hosts of the famous television show "Destroyers of Legends" went to Africa to with their own eyes seeHow elephants react on mice. For the experiment, they took a ball of dried elephant manure, made a hole in it, hid a rodent there and tied a ball to a rope. When the elephant approached the “trap”, the leader pulled the rope and the mouse turned out to be right in front of the elephant. On the air, they showed twice how the animal stopped and bypassed the “trap” in such cases. When the presenters repeated the experiment without a mouse, the elephant ignored the movement of the ball of manure. The presenters made regarding the reliability of the myth Verdict “Plausible”, that is, “probably not excluded”. The "destroyers of the legends" embarrassed that they did not see the manifestations of fear in the behavior of the elephant: "It was not a panic flight, as in cartoons, but he behaved carefully and carefully."
Believe researcher Elephants to John a carpenter, the results of the experiment would hardly differ from those received if they used another small animal instead of a mouse. Expert Notesthat elephants react not to a specific animal, but to a sharp movement, because because of poor vision they cannot quickly understand whether the danger is to wait, and are reinsured. In a similar way, elephants can behave, for example, with a sudden appearance Squirrels or Goats. According to the carpenter, the elephant can scare "anything that moves next to him."
The fact that mice do not evoke special feelings in elephants confirmed another experiment. His Spent In 2006, the circus trainer Troy Melzer, who brought the mouse to elephants and watched how they react. The wards of Meltsers did not pay any attention to the rodent: it turns out, at least mice in a static position are not afraid of the elephants, and moving - no more than other small animals. Whom the elephants really fear is bees and some species Muravyov, whose bites can damage the delicate mucous membrane of the trunk.
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