Elephants for Africa (EfA) is an NGO collecting long-term data on interactions and associations between individual African savanna elephants, which are identified using ear notch patterns, tusk morphology, and other characteristics. We conduct our research in Botswana's Makgadikgadi Pans National Park (MPNP). The MPNP elephant population is of interest to us as it consists of predominantly bull elephants – over 95% of the elephants that we record are transient males. Therefore, it is an ideal place to study the social behavior of the all-male groups found in this ‘bull area’. Knowing who is who helps us understand the social requirements of male elephants; Who do they choose to hang out with? Do older males mentor the younger males? So many questions remain unanswered about this iconic species!

 

Within the park, EfA employs both focal follows (in-person observations) and camera traps to track the elephant population. When elephants were sighted in person, the research team took multiple images of each elephant’s ears and tusks to build a database that can be used to recognize the same individuals when they are next encountered. 

 

The tasks you'll be working on in the General Features, Ear Features and Special Feature Workflows will be combined to form a string of characters that encode an elephant's identifying features into an identification (ID) code. These ID codes help experts identify individuals across multiple images to create an accurate elephant database. The ID codes are based on the System for Elephant Ear-Pattern Knowledge (SEEK) coding system developed in South Africa which you can read about here! See the graphic below for a summary of the parts of an ID code.