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By Karey Burek

Communication seems to come easy to humans, and it may astound you, but all living creatures communicate in some way. Humans have a tendency to believe they are a superior being because they can think, feel and reason. Recently, many studies have proven that creatures once thought to be less intelligent, are actually very smart and adaptable.

When honeybees find a specific flower that can provide nectar and pollen to the hive, they spin around and dance, giving the worker bee's directions to that exact flower! This would be considered a gesture, like humans gesture by holding up their hand to wave hello.

However, animals have the unique capability to communicate with scent. Ants that are frightened by an intruder emit chemical alarms that other ants can smell. Everyone then takes cover or gears up for attack. There are over 500 species of fish that use electricity to communicate. For example, a banded knifefish can scare a rival by flashing his electrical signal on and off.

Animals make noise to communicate as well. Dogs bark and growl, cats purr, roosters call and whales chirp and click to sing their songs. Anyone who has watched animal planet knows that researchers have successfully communicated with chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans with sign language or symbols on a keyboard.

Until quite recently, scientists believed that animals didn't communicate they believed animals just vocalized. The difference between vocalizing and communicating is that vocalizing would be if you screamed when you were scared, however, communicating would be to tell the person who scared you that they were a jerk! University of Arizona researchers used prairie dogs to figure out that animals communicate. They recorded their high-pitched barks and found that their varying tones conveyed information. Also, their bark varied depending on what predator was approaching.

They uncovered something amazing. Researchers would send a human to walk through the prairie dog colony, then a dog and then a rodent. They found that all the prairie dogs used a different pitched bark depending on the animal. Further research uncovered that they had a unique bark for each human-as if to say, "watch out for the short guy, or beware of the lady in the blue shoes." Simply amazing!!