Richard Collins: Are we the scariest creatures of all?
A giraffe flees at the sound of human voices. Wildlife fear humans far more than lions according to a study
Wild animals give people a wide berth. Even those living close to us are wary. But there are some who don’t fear humans and refuse to bow the knee. A polar bear, for example, may attack a person without provocation.
Most people are fond of wild creatures — except rats — and the animals have responded. Fantastic Mr Fox, the lovable rogue who had a bounty on his head not so long ago, is now a law-abiding resident of the leafy suburbs. However, we should remember Worcester’s remark in Henry IV; "treason is but trusted like the fox, who ne’er so tame so cherish’d and lock’d up, will have a wild trick of his ancestors".
Fear of the human “super predator” pervades the South African savanna – new in Current Biology. Wildlife fear humans far more than lions!https://t.co/aXBqs8EGxYhttps://t.co/VTyO1DrlhFhttps://t.co/26rOrJ0BOU
— Zanette Lab (@ZanetteLab) October 5, 2023
#ecology #science #nature #BehavioralEcology pic.twitter.com/GAo1m9PBB6
Wolves now scavenge Eastern European rubbish tips; and leopards are living peacefully in urban India. "The wolf shall lay with the lamb and the leopard shall lie down with the kid," according to the Book of Isaiah... but we are not quite at that stage yet.
Cuddly delusions about friendly wild creatures can be dangerous. Despite repeated warnings from park rangers, Anthony Treadwell, the ‘Grizzly Man’, took to living with wild bears in Alaska. He and his partner, Amie Huguenard, paid a tragic price for their sentimentality. Both were mauled to death by what they thought were new-found friends. Familiarity with dangerous animals can breed complacency, even among people who should know better: the legendary Steve Irwin was killed by a stingray he was filming.
But to what extent do wild creatures trust us? Liana Zanette, and colleagues from the University of Western Canada, address this question in a paper just published.
Her team set up motion-sensitive camera-traps, incorporating loudspeakers, at watering holes in South Africa’s Kruger Park, home to the world’s largest lion population. Anything approaching a camera would trigger a broadcast of animal and human sounds. These included gunshots, dogs barking, human speech and the growling of lions. The human sounds were relaxed conversational ones, while the lion vocalisations between members in prides, were deemed to be the feline equivalent of people chatting.
The researchers recorded 10,720 videos over 764 camera-trap days across 21 water holes. Twenty-six mammalian species were logged. An elephant was so incensed by the lion sounds that it charged and destroyed the loud speaker.
I have watched animals at water-holes in Kruger. There was always tension in the air. All were hyper-vigilant and nervous. The growling of the King of Beasts, although I didn’t hear it, must surely terrify them. Zanette’s research, however, showed that they are more frightened of human voices than they were of lion growls. Even leopards hyenas and warthogs were fearful of humans.
"As a whole, wildlife were twice as likely to run and abandoned waterholes, in 40% faster time, in response to humans than to lions (or hunting sounds)," the researchers note.
"Our results greatly strengthen the growing experimental evidence that wildlife worldwide fear the human ‘super-predator far more than other predators’."
