Research Proves Drones Sound Like Bees, Which Is Good News for Elephants

There isn't much that scares a fully grown African elephant. It turns out that what really scares elephants is something much smaller, although it can fly in large swarms: honeybees. And it makes sense, because an elephant's bulk doesn't do much to protect it from bees, which can find all kinds of unpleasant nooks and crannies to sting. Elephants reliably flee from bees, which has led some communities to create fences made of beehives to keep elephants from raiding their crops. A few years ago, researchers from Duke University brought a quadcopter to Wonga Wongue National Park in Gabon, in West Africa, to develop a system for monitoring African forest elephants. The elephants did not appreciate being monitored by a drone one bit, and would run away from it or even throw dirt at it with their trunks.