Ancient Claims Meet Modern Science

For thousands of years, people have reported unusual animal behavior before earthquakes strike. Dogs bark frantically for no apparent reason. Horses refuse to enter their stables. Birds abandon their nests en masse. Fish jump out of water. Snakes emerge from hibernation in the middle of winter. These accounts appear across cultures and centuries, from ancient Greek writings to modern eyewitness reports following major earthquakes.

But can animals actually detect earthquakes before they occur, or are these stories a combination of coincidence, selective memory, and pattern-seeking in the aftermath of traumatic events? The question has intrigued scientists for decades, and the answer turns out to be more complicated than a simple yes or no.

The Challenge of Studying Earthquake Prediction

Earthquakes are notoriously difficult to predict. Unlike hurricanes or winter storms that develop over days with visible atmospheric changes, earthquakes can strike with little to no warning. Most occur along fault lines where tectonic plates meet, but the exact timing remains largely unpredictable despite decades of research and sophisticated monitoring equipment.

This unpredictability makes it extremely difficult to study whether animals can sense earthquakes in advance. You can’t set up controlled experiments because you don’t know when or where an earthquake will occur. Scientists must rely on anecdotal reports after earthquakes happen, and these reports have significant limitations.

People tend to remember unusual animal behavior when it’s followed by a dramatic event like an earthquake, but they forget the countless times animals acted strangely and nothing happened. This is called confirmation bias—we remember the hits and forget the misses. Additionally, reports of animal behavior often emerge after the earthquake, raising questions about whether memories are being reconstructed or exaggerated in light of what happened.

What Could Animals Potentially Detect?

If animals can sense earthquakes before they strike, they would need to detect some physical change that occurs before the main quake. Scientists have identified several possibilities, though evidence for each remains limited.

Foreshocks: Many large earthquakes are preceded by smaller tremors called foreshocks, though not all earthquakes have them, and it’s impossible to know whether a small tremor is a foreshock or just an isolated event until after the fact. Animals might be more sensitive to these subtle vibrations than humans are, particularly animals that live underground or have body parts in contact with the ground.

Ground tilting and strain: As pressure builds along a fault line before an earthquake, the ground may tilt or deform slightly. Some researchers have proposed that animals might detect these minuscule changes through their bodies or by noticing secondary effects like changes in groundwater levels or the release of gases from rocks under stress.

Electromagnetic changes: Laboratory studies have shown that rocks under extreme pressure can generate electromagnetic signals. Some scientists hypothesize that animals sensitive to electromagnetic fields—including certain birds, fish, and possibly dogs—might detect these signals before an earthquake.

Gas releases: Stressed rocks can release radon and other gases that rise through the ground and enter the air or water. Animals with acute senses of smell or those living in burrows might detect these chemical changes.

Low-frequency sounds: Earthquakes generate infrasound—sound waves below the frequency humans can hear. Some animals, including elephants, whales, and certain birds, can detect infrasound. It’s possible they could hear acoustic signals from shifting rock before the main earthquake occurs.

The Evidence Is Mixed and Complicated

Scientific studies of animal behavior before earthquakes have produced inconsistent results. Some studies have documented changes in animal behavior before seismic events, while others have found no correlation.

A 2020 study published in Ethology tracked the movements of farm animals in an earthquake-prone region of Italy using collar sensors. Researchers found that cows, sheep, and dogs showed unusual movement patterns hours before some earthquakes—but only when the animals were close to the earthquake’s epicenter and only for stronger earthquakes. The closer to the epicenter and the stronger the quake, the earlier the unusual behavior began.

However, other studies monitoring animal behavior in zoos, on farms, and in laboratory settings have failed to find reliable patterns of pre-earthquake behavior. A major challenge is that animals exhibit unusual behavior for many reasons—illness, weather changes, predators, mating behavior, hunger, or simple randomness. Distinguishing genuine earthquake precursor detection from normal behavioral variation is extremely difficult.

Cultural Reports and Historical Accounts

Despite the lack of conclusive scientific evidence, reports of unusual animal behavior before earthquakes are remarkably consistent across different cultures and time periods.

In 373 BCE, the ancient Greek historian wrote about rats, weasels, snakes, and centipedes deserting the city of Helice days before a devastating earthquake destroyed it. In 1975, Chinese officials ordered the evacuation of Haicheng based partly on reports of unusual animal behavior, and a major earthquake struck hours later—though this success has never been reliably repeated, and many subsequent earthquakes in China occurred without clear animal warning signs.

More recently, the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami produced numerous reports of animals fleeing to higher ground before the waves arrived. Elephants in Sri Lanka reportedly moved inland, flamingos abandoned low-lying breeding areas, and zoo animals became agitated—though these reports are anecdotal and difficult to verify independently.

The Problem With Anecdotal Evidence

Personal accounts of animal behavior before earthquakes are compelling, but they suffer from several problems that make them unreliable as scientific evidence.

First, millions of animals exist in earthquake-prone regions. With such large numbers, some animals will always be behaving unusually at any given moment just by chance. When an earthquake happens to occur during a period of unusual behavior, it seems meaningful—but this could be pure coincidence.

Second, people are much more likely to report and remember unusual animal behavior after an earthquake than before one. If your dog barks frantically one night and nothing happens, you forget about it. If your dog barks frantically and an earthquake strikes hours later, you remember and report it. This creates a biased dataset where apparent successes are documented while failures are ignored.

Third, the definition of “unusual behavior” is subjective and varies from person to person. What seems unusual to one observer might be normal variation to another. Without objective, continuous monitoring, it’s impossible to establish a reliable baseline for comparison.

What About Tsunami Animals?

The case for animals detecting tsunamis may be stronger than for earthquakes themselves. Tsunamis create infrasound that travels faster than the water waves, potentially giving animals advance warning. Additionally, animals near coastlines might detect the initial withdrawal of water or subtle changes in wave patterns before the main tsunami wave arrives.

Several witnesses to the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami reported elephants moving to higher ground and refusing to approach beaches in the hours before the waves struck. While still anecdotal, these reports are more plausible from a physics standpoint because tsunamis produce detectable signals that travel ahead of the destructive waves.

Current Scientific Consensus

Most seismologists and animal behavior experts remain skeptical that animals provide reliable earthquake prediction. The scientific consensus is that while some animals may detect certain precursor signals in specific circumstances—particularly when very close to a shallow earthquake’s epicenter—this doesn’t translate into a reliable or practical early warning system.

The sensitivity required to detect subtle precursor signals would likely also make animals sensitive to countless other environmental changes that don’t result in earthquakes, creating a high rate of false alarms. Even if animals can sometimes sense earthquakes minutes or hours in advance, this doesn’t help humans unless we can accurately interpret the behavior and distinguish genuine warnings from normal variation.

Better to Trust Technology Than Animals

Modern earthquake early warning systems use networks of seismometers to detect the initial, faster-moving P-waves from an earthquake and issue warnings before the slower but more destructive S-waves arrive. These systems can provide seconds to minutes of warning for areas distant from the epicenter—not much time, but enough to take protective actions like dropping, covering, and holding on.

These technological systems are far more reliable than attempting to interpret animal behavior. They work on measurable physical principles, can be calibrated and tested, don’t suffer from confirmation bias, and provide quantifiable warning times.

The Mystery Remains Open

The question of whether animals can sense earthquakes hasn’t been definitively answered, and it may never be. The challenges of studying unpredictable events, separating signal from noise in animal behavior, and overcoming human cognitive biases make this an extraordinarily difficult research question.

Perhaps some animals do possess sensitivity to precursor signals that current instruments can’t detect. Or perhaps the thousands of years of reports reflect nothing more than coincidence, selective memory, and humanity’s desire to find patterns and control the uncontrollable. The most honest answer science can currently provide is: we don’t know for certain, but the evidence for reliable animal earthquake prediction remains weak.

Until conclusive evidence emerges, the safest approach is to prepare for earthquakes through proven methods—securing heavy furniture, maintaining emergency supplies, knowing how to protect yourself during shaking—rather than watching your pets for signs of impending disaster.