Why our domestic cats and dogs know how to hunt and kill successfully without being thought by their mom?
Carnivores in the wild teach their cubs how to hunt and kill.So why they say you can’t put zoo animals into the wild without training them but our domestic animals kill small animals without training?
July 19th, 2010 at 9:08 am
Its there animal instinct, a god given gift.
July 19th, 2010 at 9:33 am
Instinct
July 19th, 2010 at 9:49 am
It’s an instinctive behavior that all predatory animals have somewhere inside. That doesn’t mean that a captive bred lion will survive out in the wild.
For one thing, it may be instinct to hunt prey, but the method used to successfully do so is not instinctive. In the wild lions in a pride hunt together. Some lay in the grass and others flush the prey toward the lions in waiting. A captive bred lion released into the wild would have a very difficult time finding a pride to join and would have no knowledge of this method. They would most likely see prey, be hungry, run out too soon/loudly and chase them all away
When our pets kill smaller animals, like a cat bringing you a dead mouse… it isn’t that the cat necessarily hunted it for food. The mouse probably came into view close to the cat, the cat saw movement, thought “TOY!” and pounced on it. One of my cats used to catch mice to play with them. I saw her one time and she never intended to kill it. She was just playing… but she jumped on a tiny mouse and it ended up dying. She then brought me its body.
Domesticated animals don’t NEED to hunt, we provide them with food. So when they catch something it’s usually for fun or because instinct told them to catch and kill. This doesn’t make them expert hunters/predators by any means though. In fact, many abandoned pets die because they’re unable to hunt enough food to stay alive. Have you ever seen a stray dog or cat digging for food through garbage? They can’t rely on being hunters to survive.
So instinct only goes so far… the actual method of success needs to be learned.