[mrtew]

Where are all the dead animals? Sri Lanka asks 29 Dec 2004 07:21:00 GMT Source: Reuters

COLOMBO, Dec 29 (Reuters) - Sri Lankan wildlife officials are stunned -- the worst tsunami in memory has killed around 22,000 people along the Indian Ocean island's coast, but they can't find any dead animals.
Giant waves washed floodwaters up to 3 km (2 miles) inland at Yala National Park in the ravaged southeast, Sri Lanka's biggest wildlife reserve and home to hundreds of wild elephants and several leopards. "The strange thing is we haven't recorded any dead animals," H.D. Ratnayake, deputy director of the national Wildlife Department, told Reuters on Wednesday. "No elephants are dead, not even a dead hare or rabbit," he added. "I think animals can sense disaster. They have a sixth sense. They know when things are happening."


So is that the answer? The animals all have ESP? Or are they a lot tougher and faster than humans? Or they just don't play on the beach and sit around resorts? Why did the wave only kill humans and fish?

[Mastrap]

Originally posted by mrtew:
Or they just don't play on the beach and sit around resorts?

I suspect that might be the answer. Interesting.


There's also reports of scuba divers coming in who didn't feel a thing or a mild current at most. They only found out what had happened when they cam back to the surface.

[i_rooster]

what above pet dog?

[ort888]

The animals were obviously behind the whole thing.

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by mrtew:
Where are all the dead animals? Sri Lanka asks 29 Dec 2004 07:21:00 GMT Source: Reuters

COLOMBO, Dec 29 (Reuters) - Sri Lankan wildlife officials are stunned -- the worst tsunami in memory has killed around 22,000 people along the Indian Ocean island's coast, but they can't find any dead animals.
Giant waves washed floodwaters up to 3 km (2 miles) inland at Yala National Park in the ravaged southeast, Sri Lanka's biggest wildlife reserve and home to hundreds of wild elephants and several leopards. "The strange thing is we haven't recorded any dead animals," H.D. Ratnayake, deputy director of the national Wildlife Department, told Reuters on Wednesday. "No elephants are dead, not even a dead hare or rabbit," he added. "I think animals can sense disaster. They have a sixth sense. They know when things are happening."


So is that the answer? The animals all have ESP? Or are they a lot tougher and faster than humans? Or they just don't play on the beach and sit around resorts? Why did the wave only kill humans and fish?

I think there are studies showing animals can sense earthquakes before they happen, something to do with their sensitivity to very low-level vibrations. I am too lazy to do a Google search but there were lots of reports of weird dog behavior before the Loma Prieta quake in California a few years back.

My two-bit theory is that thery felt some sort of pre-tremor and all scattered to someplace safer, safer for the animals anyway. This behavior in reaction to the earthquake wound up protecting them from the resulting tsunami. Sigh! Sometimes instinct is a good thing.

[roam]

There can be a knock-on effect amongst animals when it comes to disturbances in climate, or earth changes. For instance, a dog might sense thunder long before a rabbit, or human, but the rabbit will observe the unusaual behaviour of the dog and take lead from it.

I reckon that what has happened in Sri Lanka is a combination of animals shying away from the resorts, and their sense of the impeding disaster. Also, the way in which the waves hit Sri Lanka are slightly different to India, and perhaps many of the animals that were in the vicinity, haven't been washed up on the shore yet.

[voyageur]

dcmacdaddy, you're right, there have been some studies correlating the number of "lost dog" reports in California newspapers with earthquakes, and scientists have found a positive correlation, for what that's worth.
Certainly it's possible that there may be some ultra-low frequency waves emitted prior to the "big one" that animals can sense.
I wonder about whales, who have especially good hearing in the very low frequency range, and whether it would be worth following their behavior.

[d4nth3m4n]

tsunamis aren't hurricanes, you can easily evacuate them by finding higher ground. i don't think there were too many animals within 50 feet of sea level. that's all.

we're so used to storm related natural disasters that we have trouble comprehending something that you have to be near the coast for. and REALLY near the coast at that. or on an atoll, then you're screwed.

[voyageur]

Yes, I doubt there are many leopards and other large mammals in the lowlands close to the shore.

[d4nth3m4n]

anyone know the topography of sri lanka offhand? i might eat crow yet.

[f1000]

Originally posted by voyageur:
dcmacdaddy, you're right, there have been some studies correlating the number of "lost dog" reports in California newspapers with earthquakes, and scientists have found a positive correlation, for what that's worth.
Certainly it's possible that there may be some ultra-low frequency waves emitted prior to the "big one" that animals can sense.
I wonder about whales, who have especially good hearing in the very low frequency range, and whether it would be worth following their behavior.

It makes little evolutionary sense for animals to have built-in tremor detectors. Strong earthquakes are relatively rare events, and most deaths among humans are caused by falling edifices - something that animals don't have to contend with.

My guess is that large animals don't live in large numbers along the shore because of human development. Those that do, such as sea turtles, are aquatic and would survive inundation anyway. Birds, of course, can simply fly away.

[budster101]

Originally posted by ort888:
The animals were obviously behind the whole thing.

I'm with you. The animals were most likely the culprits here.

I also know for a fact, my dog has special sensory perception when it comes to vibrations, because every time I get into bed with my wife a bit too agressively, and he is in the next room, he has to come and watch. Nosey bugger.

[waxcrash]

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...keanimals.html

[wdlove]

I'm with the majority, the animals stay away from the coast. Animals also seem to be able to sense impending disaster.

[f1000]

Originally posted by waxcrash:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...keanimals.html

I don't deny that dogs and other animals might be more sensitive to certain types of sensory stimulation that humans can't detect; I just don't believe that these senses evolved as bonafide tremor detectors. As such, I doubt that these animals exhibit any behaviors to take advantage of their preternatural earthquake premonitions.

[rambo47]

It was Bush. The animals were duped into acting as his pawns.

[Abu Bakr]

Originally posted by d4nth3m4n:
anyone know the topography of sri lanka offhand? i might eat crow yet.

Topography:

http://iri.ldeo.columbia.edu/~lareef...files/TOPO.JPG

Yala National Park:

http://www.ucanfly.com.lk/images/sri-lanka-map_new.jpg

[roberto blanco]

dead? they're all alive and well on noah's arc "part deux".

*SCNR*

[mdc]

Originally posted by Mastrap:
There's also reports of scuba divers coming in who didn't feel a thing or a mild current at most. They only found out what had happened when they cam back to the surface.

very interesting.

i agree with the animals not being too close to the beaches.

[Eriamjh]

Animals aren't like humans. They don't go on vacation and sit around looking at beaches. When something seems off, they get the hell out. They don't waste time watching TV, playing Xbox, or pull out their video cameras when something unusual happens.

For being so "dumb" animals never go against their gut feeling, better judgement, or ever risk personal harm. They leave.

[mrtew]

Well I'm sure that there weren't a lot of leopards on the beaches but I think of villages in poorer countries being over run by stray dogs, especially the areas where tourists and fishermen are. My theory is that they are just so much tougher than humans are that they survived. Dogs can get hit by cars and survive half the time. I bet they just swam around and got back out of the water. Humans are so delicate.

[Super Mario]

Indonesian and Thai people eat *everything*.

[roam]

Here's the answer, from the BBC:
"Also, naturalists on the island said large-scale animal deaths appear to have been avoided, with many sensing the approach of the wave and fleeing to high ground."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asi...ic/4132725.stm

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

A saw a guy being interviewed saying there were lots of dead dogs all over the place.

My guess not many leopards and elephants were spending the day on the beach.

[Super Mario]

Beasts are environmentally civil and psychic. When they run humans should run after. Super Mario knows dogs don't lie.

[Scientist]

The reason the animals survived is obvious. Mammals first evolved in environments ravaged by giant, tremor causing, flesh-eating dinosaurs. Mammels developed tremor sensing ability to avoid being eaten. The best place to go to avoid being eaten was to run up and hide in a tall tree. Modern mammels inherit this ability sense. When the cats felt the first tremors they all climbed up tall trees for safety. Pigs and dogs and other less dexterous animals, still retaining this dinosaur escaping instinct, simply ran to high ground, which is the closest thing to climbing a tree. Humans, of course lost this ability because it evolved in the context of quadruped locomotion. We only have two limbs attached to the ground at any one time, making us unable to feel the slight tremors that animals can so easily sense. Duh.

[Abu Bakr]

Couldn't it simply be that because most animals are able to run faster than the 25-45km/h speed of the tsunami when it hits the beach that they were able to run for cover when they saw it come? That would also explain why so few have witnessed any "unusual" behaviour from the animals just before the tsunami hit.

[buffalolee]

Maybe the animals were not any close to any resorts or beaches. When was the last time you saw an elephant by the beach trying to sun bathe?

[Abu Bakr]

Originally posted by buffalolee:
Maybe the animals were not any close to any resorts or beaches. When was the last time you saw an elephant by the beach trying to sun bathe?

here?

[jbartone]

They're here:

http://www.hsiasia.org/News/News05.htm

Dr. Sarojini Varadappan and Ms. Bhargavi Devendra, President and Honorary Secretary respectively of the Red Cross, Tamil Nadu Branch made a personal visit to areas up to 200 kms down the coast from Madras (where the Blue Cross is headquartered) and have personally told us of the literally thousands of dead animals they saw all along the beaches.

In Madras city, our volunteer, one attender and drivers spent the whole of Sunday and till the early hours of Monday helping whatever animals they could. The first few hours were spent just cutting loose tethered goats and cattle but many dogs and snakes (including a king cobra) were rescued. The snakes were handed over to the Forest Department's Snake Park. Three of the rescued dogs have littered - the last one just an hour ago while the Secretary of the Animal Welfare Board of India was in the Blue Cross!

[Mac Guru]

There's also reports of scuba divers coming in who didn't feel a thing or a mild current at most. They only found out what had happened when they came back to the surface.

Highly likely since Tsunami's only gain their height after approaching shallow water. It's well known that you can be simply sitting in a boat in the ocean, and have a tsunami pass right on by and never know it.

Mac Guru

[scaught]

Originally posted by Super Mario:
Indonesian and Thai people eat *everything*.

no dead animals over here, sir.

*burp*

[DanTM]

Originally posted by scaught:
no dead animals over here, sir.

*burp*

oh, i get it now.

EDIT: oh crap, how the hell?

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by buffalolee:
Maybe the animals were not any close to any resorts or beaches. When was the last time you saw an elephant by the beach trying to sun bathe?

Originally posted by Abu Bakr:
here?

Is it just me or does that dog (follow the link) look like it knows it's about to become lunch for the fat guy?