Elephants Know When It's Raining 150 Miles Away

Maybe the Weather Channel should start hiring elephants. A study in PLoS ONE suggests the creatures can detect rainstorms happening 150 miles away, possibly by hearing them even from that far off.  Migrating elephants are known to change direction out of the blue, and researchers haven't been certain why. The Namibian research team figured it might be because of rain—as Phys.org explains, elephants are regularly looking for water in the region, which is dry outside of the January-to-March rainy season.

http://tinyurl.com/l53n3el

New Deep Sea Species Found Off Australian Coast

Scientists say two new animal species discovered off the Australian coast in 1986 have the potential to "reshape the tree of life."  A study in scientific journal PLOS ONE describes the mushroom-shaped organisms for the first time since their discovery. Although the organisms, known as Dendrogramma enigmatica and Dendrogramma discoides, resemble extinct forms from more than 600 million years ago, scientists have not classified them into an existing animal group.

http://tinyurl.com/nkrr8e3

Brazil Dolphin First New River Species Since 1918

Scientists in Brazil have discovered the first new river dolphin species since the end of World War One.  Named after the Araguaia river where it was found, the species is only the fifth known of its kind in the world.  Writing in the journal Plos One, the researchers say it separated from other South American river species more than two million years ago.  There are believed to be about 1,000 of the creatures living in the Araguaia river basin.  River dolphins are among the world's rarest creatures.

http://tinyurl.com/ovh7veg

Male Orangutans Found to Share Travel Plans

After several years tracking orangutans in the Sumatran swamplands, researchers made some surprising discoveries, they report in the journal PLoS One: males make travel plans up to 24 hours in advance and share them with nearby orangutans by emitting long, loud calls that can be heard more than a half-mile away.

http://tinyurl.com/kfmslkq