Shirley, an elephant, has something to say. She opens her mouth and speaks. The nearby elephants understand the sound, but it is just noise to me.

What is Shirley exactly saying? Scientists are not sure, but they are trying to find out how elephants communicate. I visited Shirley at the Elephant Sanctuary (避难所) in Hohenwald, Tennessee. The sanctuary is home of Shirley and five other elephants —Bunny, Jenny, Sissy, Tarra and Winkie. All six animals were once in zoos or circuses (马戏团). Now they walk freely in the forests.

A noisy group

Not all the elephants speak like Shirley. Tarra speaks like a sea lion when she is happy. Bunny squeaks (吱吱叫) often. I soon get used to hearing the different voices of the elephants. When one gray giant comes close to me, I know which elephant it is.

Elephants also communicate in a way that people can’t hear. Scientists believe that elephant’s sound can travel for miles. Elephants in a group use it to keep in touch when they are alone.

       The elephants speak to one another for the same reasons people talk. Sometimes they even shout with excitement. When Shirley first came to the sanctuary, Jenny looked at her and began to shout. Shirley shouted back. At first, the animal keepers had no idea what it was about. Later, they discovered that Shirley and Jenny had stayed together for 20 years earlier in a circus. They still knew each other.

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There are two kinds of elephants—Asian elephants and African elephants. In the wild, both kinds are endangered. In 1970, almost 2 million Asian elephants lived in the wild in Southeast Asia. Now there are only 25, 600 to 32, 750 elephants living there. Their home is being gradually destroyed. As the population grows, humans are building on more of the land. In Africa, many wild elephants lived there 20 years ago. But today, only half of them still live there.

It seems that every day we read about at least one of these (earthquakes, floods and tsunamis(海啸)) somewhere in the world. But every year, somewhere, another kind of disaster causes great damage to plants and people. It’s something much smaller and not so well-known as an earthquake or a tsunami—it’s an insect called the locust(蝗虫) .

The locust usually does things alone—it lives on its own and eats on its own. But, sometimes, something changes the way nature works. When the number of locusts increases somewhere and there are lots of plants to eat, the locusts get together in swarms.

Perhaps the most dangerous locust is the desert locust. It is found in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia—in about 60 countries altogether. When desert locusts swarm, they bring problems to one-tenth of all the humans in the world.

The numbers are huge and frightening. A swarm of desert locusts can be 1, 200 km² in size-imagine an area that is over 20 kilometers wide and 50 kilometers long, full of locusts! And there can be 50 million locusts in each square kilometer. Each locust eats its own weight in plants every day—so a swarm of desert locusts can eat more than 150 million kilos of food in one day. They can also fly very long distances—in 1954 a swarm of locusts from northwest Africa flew thousands of miles to finally land in Great Britain.

It’s no wonder that farmers in many countries of the world fear the desert locusts more than snakes and spiders (蜘蛛). It’s the desert locusts that destroy the harvest and brings hunger to people all over the world.

In the town of Lampang in northern Thailand, there is an unusual group of musicians. They play many different kinds of music—from traditional Thai songs to music by Beethoven. Both children and adults love this group. What makes them so popular? Is it their music? Their looks? Yes, it's both of these things, but it's also something else：they're elephants.

These musical elephants are from the Thai Elephant Conservation Center （TECC）in Lampang. The TECC protects elephants. It teaches people to understand and care for these huge, but gentle, animals. And, like many zoos around the world, the TECC encourages elephants to paint.

Richard Lair works with the TECC. He knew that elephants hear better than they see. So he had an idea：if elephants are intelligent and they have good hearing, maybe they can play music. To test his idea, Lair and a friend started the Thai Elephant Orchestra. During a performance, the elephants play a variety of instruments, including the drums and the xylophone. The animals also use their voices and trunks to make sounds.

But can elephants really make music properly? Yes, says Lair. they’re very creative. Humans may encourage the animals to play instruments, but the elephants make their own songs；they don't just copy their trainers or other people. There are now CDs of the group's music, which make money for the TECC. And the music these artists create is pretty amazing.