MOTP sounds really good. I'll have to check it out.
I remember watching a great show on Discovery or Animal Planet, can't remember which. They were trying to reintroduce wild dogs to parts of Africa where they've been wiped out. The places where the dogs currently survive are now being threatened by over-population.
It was both tragic and fascinating. The team monitored a group of dogs in their usual habitat and a group of reintroduced dogs. It all really came down to a equation having to do with energy expended during a hunt, and food eaten (i.e. energy regained) as a result of the hunt. The long and short of it -- the margin for error in sub-Saharan Africa is so narrow that a failed hunt or two means disaster for a pack of dogs. They expend too much energy on a fruitless hunt and then they're too tired to make the next kill. They end up only being able to take out the weakest and flabbiest prey which don't have much meat on them. It a long, sad, downward spiral with only one end. The scientists learned that the dogs need to be intimately familiar with the terrain and their prey to be successful, and a transplanted pack simply can't get their shit together fast enough in a new environment. They could if they had some preseason training, but they don't get one.
It speaks to the point of animals adapting to live in harsh environments, and how a little thing like global warming can fuck with the temperature by even a degree or two and all of a sudden the ecosystem changes and it's bye-bye to all those creatures who spent a couple thousand years evolving into a lifeform that can survive on the margin. Films like MOTP do a great job showing that these guys have a tough enough life as it is; too bad the people who should be seeing this kind of movie won't, and probably wouldn't care if they did.
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branchandroot
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Date: Wednesday, 3 August 2005 13:55 (UTC)I remember watching a great show on Discovery or Animal Planet, can't remember which. They were trying to reintroduce wild dogs to parts of Africa where they've been wiped out. The places where the dogs currently survive are now being threatened by over-population.
It was both tragic and fascinating. The team monitored a group of dogs in their usual habitat and a group of reintroduced dogs. It all really came down to a equation having to do with energy expended during a hunt, and food eaten (i.e. energy regained) as a result of the hunt. The long and short of it -- the margin for error in sub-Saharan Africa is so narrow that a failed hunt or two means disaster for a pack of dogs. They expend too much energy on a fruitless hunt and then they're too tired to make the next kill. They end up only being able to take out the weakest and flabbiest prey which don't have much meat on them. It a long, sad, downward spiral with only one end. The scientists learned that the dogs need to be intimately familiar with the terrain and their prey to be successful, and a transplanted pack simply can't get their shit together fast enough in a new environment. They could if they had some preseason training, but they don't get one.
It speaks to the point of animals adapting to live in harsh environments, and how a little thing like global warming can fuck with the temperature by even a degree or two and all of a sudden the ecosystem changes and it's bye-bye to all those creatures who spent a couple thousand years evolving into a lifeform that can survive on the margin. Films like MOTP do a great job showing that these guys have a tough enough life as it is; too bad the people who should be seeing this kind of movie won't, and probably wouldn't care if they did.
(sigh)
- Trent