Rare twin elephants born in Thailand | Hacker News Reader

Rare twin elephants born in Thailand

bbc.com

60 pointspriyankanath10 comments

Twin elephants rarely survive in the wild. Elephant mothers have difficulty producing enough milk for two calves.

> The second birth sent the mother into a panic and caretakers had to restrain her to prevent her from stepping on the female calf

And the mother might not have enough milk to feed more than one (according to video). I guess it's nature's cruel way of ensuring "one healthy successor instead of 2 weak ones that might end up eaten by lions").

It makes me wonder is that why human woman have two breasts? In case of twins or human twin births used to be more common?

edit: It seems elephants also have two nipples. I had to Google "how many nipples do elephants have" this is my life.

I'm thinking it's bilateral symmetry.

A woman with just one breast over the breast plate would also be bilaterally symmetric. Although, the heart, the lungs, the liver, the stomach, the intestines, and probably more, are all bilaterally asymmetric, so it would seem there are no rules that demand symmetry.

If we all had one nipple, we would have had to have evolved from a species with an even number nipples, which likely means one nipple migrating to the center like a founder's eyes. All of those things we have one of we've had one of forever. Going from an even number of things to an odd number would be a strange trick seldom practiced.

> Twins occur in only one percent of elephant births and male-female are even more rare, according to Save the Elephants, a research organisation.

1% is "rare", I guess, but I'm not sure exactly why it's newsworthy. About 3% of human births are twins, so twin elephant births aren't much rarer.

There aren't 7 billions elephants in the world.

Three times more rare.

> Dramatic footage on social media showed a crowd of caretakers

Includes an interview with caretakers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQnCJYqlB3c

Reply on news.ycombinator.com