3 survival lessons from the animal kingdom that are instructive in a world where might is right.
Introduction
I had written in previous posts that the world we are living in is increasingly one where might is right. This manifests in the world of international and domestic politics. When political leaders face no consequences for bullying and predatory behaviours, business leaders will follow. Soon enough, we will all be working in environments where bullying is the norm.
How should we prepare our children to handle such situations? I summarize 3 survival lessons from the animal kingdom that would be instructive.
Lesson from the Albatross
Albatross are large seabird found mainly in the south Atlantic ocean. According to Wikipedia, they have a wingspan up to 3.7 metres, just under twice the average height of an NBA player.
The chicks of albatross are cute, white and fluffy creatures. The parents of albatross brood the chicks for about 3 weeks. After that, the chicks take up to another 260 days to fully grow their feathers and become capable of independent flight.
An albatross’ flight is a sight to behold. They are one of the most efficient long-distance travellers, flying hundreds of miles each day in search of food while expending very little energy doing so.
One would have thought that such grand creatures would have no problem escaping from predators. For a long time, this was true. In its natural habitat, islands littered in the Southern Atlantic ocean, the albatross have no natural predators. So much so that they, especially the young, have no sense of what might be an impending life-threatening danger. And even when faced with such danger face-on, they do not know how to respond.
Unexpected predators
In a 2018 Dec article, the National Geographic reported on a gruesome sight on Marion Island. The magazine showed photographs of albatross chicks with stretches of scalped skin amongst their fluffy feathers. It turned out that the injuries were inflicted by house mice a fraction the size of the chicks.
Researchers hypothesized that seal hunters probably introduced the mice 200 years ago accidentally. While the mice had historically fed on the island’s insect population, their menu had since broadened to include albatross chicks. The chicks were left alone for extended periods while their parents went hunting. Having no natural predators for centuries or even longer, albatross chicks do not have the know-how of what to do to fend off the mice. In a few videos available online, one can see the chicks feebly trying to shoo away mice which appear to be nibbling at them.
After a couple of nights of such incessant attacks, the chicks grew tired due to lack of sleep. Then they grew too weak to even make any attempt to fend off the mice. Eventually, the mice eat them alive. More recently, there were reports that the mice have even started to feed on adult albatross.
Sitting still is not an option
For a creature as awesome as the albatross to succumb to the house-mice is tragic. Yet it happened. And it can happen to the best of us if all we do in response to predatory behaviour and bullying is to sit still.
When I read about the story, the lesson I tried to impart to my child is this. Just like in the animal kingdom, taking no action will only embolden bullies in the human world. When faced with hostile people intending to do you harm, sitting still is not an option.
What moves can you take then?
Lesson from the Elks
The second of the 3 survival lessons is drawn from the elks. In a study published in Ecology Letters in 2019, Utah State University researchers Michel Kohl and Dan MacNulty offer insights into how elks in the Yellowstone National Park optimize their predator avoidance strategies.
For elks living in Yellowstone National Park, life is tough. They face about 15 different predators daily. These include wolves and cougars. In response to such hostility, the elks, amazingly, developed avoidance strategies based on their understanding of the predators’ behaviour.
“Cougars hunted mainly in forested, rugged areas at night, whereas wolves hunted mainly in grassy, flat areas during morning and at dusk, … Elk sidestepped both cougars and wolves by selecting for areas outside these high-risk domains, namely forested, rugged areas during daylight when cougars were resting, and grassy, flat areas at night when wolves were snoozing”.
This is simply the “flight” response. When the chance is low of you winning an encounter with the bully or predator, this would be the optimal response. There is no shame in keeping yourself unharmed and alive while figuring out a way to outwit the predator. Often times, during this passage of time, the predator makes mistakes and fall on his own accord, or succumbs to a bigger predator.
Lesson from the Japanese Honeybees
The last of the 3 survival lessons is inspired by Japanese honeybees.
Earlier this year, after the first wave of COVID-19 in the US state of Washington, another terror hit. This was the murder hornet, native in Asia but first sighted in the USA only in the fall of 2019.
These are insects that are more than double the size of one of its prey, the typical honeybee. According to reports, these hornets can rip through an entire honeybee hive in minutes. There was even a report that a hornet killed a mouse in under a minute. Makes me pause for a second about a potential solution to Marion Island.
While these hornets are absolute terror to the Western honeybees, it turns out that a certain species of honeybee in Japan has evolved and developed a strategy to counter hornet attacks:
“When a hornet scout locates and approaches a Japanese honey bee hive, she emits specific pheromonal hunting signals. When the Japanese honey bees detect these pheromones, 100 or so gather near the entrance of the nest and set up a trap, … As the hornet enters, a mob of hundreds of bees surrounds it in a ball, completely covering it and preventing it from reacting effectively. The bees violently vibrate their flight muscles in much the same way as they do to heat the hive in cold conditions. This raises the temperature in the ball to the critical temperature of 46 °C (115 °F). In addition, the exertions of the honey bees raise the level of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the ball. At that concentration of CO2, they can tolerate up to 50 °C (122 °F), but the hornet cannot survive the combination of high temperature and high carbon dioxide level.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_giant_hornet
This is the “fight” response. Faced with almost certain death and destruction of their hive, the Japanese honeybees united against the hornet and cooked it alive inside a ball of honeybees. I find this an inspiring David versus Goliath tale in the world of insects.
Conclusion
To conclude, these are the 3 survival lessons from the animal kingdom:
- sitting still is not an option;
- flight;
- fight.
Whether you choose to fight or flight depends on relativity. Who’s relatively stronger, whether it’s physical strength or popularity? What is the relative severity of the consequences? If “flight” brings the prospect of certain death regardless, you might as well gang up with fellow preys to inflict maximum damage to the predator on your way out.
