You might think you know the roar — the one from the iconic MGM logo that opens films. However, the famous roar was actually voiced by a tiger. Compared to lion roars, tiger sounds are raspier and higher-pitched.
A team at the University of Exeter, led by Jonathan Grocott of the Department of Ecological Research, says lion roars fall into two distinct types: loud and intermediate. The intermediate roars are flatter and less variable.
Artificial intelligence played a crucial role in reaching this conclusion. The team says distinguishing these roar types could help monitor lion populations and simplify conservation efforts.
Currently, Africa’s wild lion population is estimated at 22,000 to 25,000 individuals — roughly half what it was 25 years ago. The main drivers of the decline are habitat loss from human activity and conflicts with local communities. The IUCN Red List classifies lions as at risk of extinction.
What Did the Scientists Discover?
Roaring is a vital part of lion behavior. It not only signals the location of other pride members but also marks territory to warn intruding lions.
For their study, the team focused on the lion population in Nyerere National Park in Tanzania. Researchers recorded the animals’ sounds with camera traps, and the results were analyzed by artificial intelligence.
The researchers used supervised machine learning to classify roaring vocalizations into different sound types, focusing on loud and intermediate roars. On the spectrogram, the team observed that the loud roar was complex and arc-shaped, while the intermediate roar was flatter and less variable, often following the loud roar, as reported by Science Alert.
Using simple acoustic measures (duration and maximum frequency), the scientists identified each vocalization type with 95.4 percent accuracy.
They could also identify individual lions with 94.3 percent accuracy. That suggests roar recognition could help researchers more accurately assess population density and numbers.
Jonathan Grocott said, “It was fascinating to learn that lion communication is more complex than previously thought. However, it remains unclear what the communicative differences are between the two types of roars. For now, we can celebrate that AI is helping us learn more about such an iconic phenomenon in the wild as the lion’s roar.”
Photo: Unsplash
