Parabolic Moose Antlers

March 23, 2013 by staff 

Parabolic Moose Antlers, Canadian scientists using the trophy rack from a large male moose for a series of acoustic experiments have discovered that the beast’s antlers act like natural hearing aids, bouncing sounds – including sweet talk from a potential mate – toward its ears.

The finding, detailed in the latest issue of the European Journal of Wildlife Research, helps explain the moose’s “excellent sense of hearing” – a phenomenon variously attributed to its large ears, their placement on the animal’s head, and their unusual shape and flexibility, the study states.

The mammal’s massive, branching antlers appear to serve as “a parabolic reflector of sounds” and “aid in moose communication,” conclude University of Guelph biologist George Bubenik and his son Peter Bubenik, a mathematician at Cleveland State University.

The researchers were testing a theory first advanced decades ago by George’s father, the late Anthony Bubenik, who was also a University of Guelph zoologist and renowned moose expert.

Using artificial ears equipped with sound meters – created by technicians from Japan’s NHK television network – the researchers sent audio signals toward the 18-kilogram, 1.38-metre-wide antlers during experiments conducted at the Ontario university’s arboretum.

The tests showed that sound reception improved by up to 20 per cent because of the antlers.

Among antlered animals, the researchers note, “only in the moose do females have a richer repertoire of vocalization than males. This indicates the importance of vocal communication in this species, whose individuals must find each other in the vast spaces of the tundra or taiga.”

The apparent hearing boost afforded by large antlers “would provide an extra advantage” in mating, they argue.

One of Canada’s iconic species, moose inhabit boreal forest and marshland from British Columbia to Newfoundland. Males of the enormous Yukon-Alaska subspecies exceed two metres at shoulder height and can weigh as much as 800 kilograms, with velvety antlers as wide as 1.8 metres from tip to tip.

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