As the bible suggests, “Ask the very beasts, and they will teach you; ask the wild birds --- they will tell you; crawling creatures will instruct you, fish in the sea will inform you.” --- Job 12; 7, 8.
In fact, watching the behavior of animals or of domesticated pets is to study life. We have several instincts that animals still possess but which Man has lost. This is because of acculturation, (adaptation) environment, education, ignorance, experience, and everyday life, which have blunted those essential instincts.
Animals that have highly developed scent glands usually signal to the other animals by secreting strong chemicals called pheromones. Their urine or faeces acts as a naming and signaling channel to other animals about their ownership of a certain territory.
This scent marks are to warn other animals and take possession of the area they exercise control. Animals of the same species are aware of this and they keep away if they don’t want to get into a fight.
But scientist are now saying that pheromones do more than just stamp territories they act as a chemical notice board that other animals “read” with keen interest. If you were in a farm, garden or in a forest, you may have not realized that a number of animals were communicating through body language.
“Animals use every sense, gesturing with appendages and body position; sending and receiving subtle – or not so subtle in the case of frightened skunks – odor signals; squeaking, squawking, singing and chirping; sending and receiving electrical signals; flashing lights; changing skin pigmentation; ‘dancing;’ and tapping and vibrating the surface they walk on.” *(The book, The Language of Animals)
Do all these signals mean something? Researchers are now beginning to discover through painstaking observation some meanings to these signals. If you had a domestic fowl in your garden, you would agree that your observation has always been that when they are making a high-pitched, KUK, KUK, KUK, KOOP KUK, they are communicating.
(Figure 3)
But you may have not realized that that sounds is to warn other fowls that a small reddish-brown flesh eating mammal called a weasel is out to prey on them.
KUK KUK KUK KOOP KUK
Figure 3
They communicate meaningful information and not meaningless rattle.
Scientist who researched deeper than that now say the fowl would emit a single long shriek if it saw a hawk and that every call is different depending on the threat at hand. This finding shows that the birds communicate meaningful information and not meaningless rattle
Plant Communication!
Did you know that plants could communicate with other plants and even with a few animals? The magazine ‘Discover’ have discovered to our amazement on the Netherlands that Lima bean plants send out distress signal to mites, which can kill their attackers.
For example, when spider mites attack these bean plants, these plants are known to release immediately a chemical that attracts other mites, which can then fight their enemy spider mites.
Many other plants like the corn, tobacco and cotton plants have their own communication mechanism. When caterpillars attack them they are scientifically known to emit wasp – a deadly enemy to caterpillars.
Accordingly one researcher has this to say, “These plants are communicating to their helpers not only that they are been attacked and harmed but also saying clearly who are the attackers.” (Figure 4)
Plants are also known to send out alarms to protect other undamaged plants whether eaten by caterpillars, injected by fungus or powdery mildew (a destructive growth of minute fungi on plants) or ingested by spider mites the chemical alarm they send also is known to beef up the defense system of undamaged plants heavily.
Figure 4
Amazing isn’t it? That Plants too can Communicate!
Insects Communication
Bees
The dancing honeybee is known to tell other bees where nectar is, how much there is, how far it is, in what direction it is and the kind of flower it is on. How does it do it? Instinctive communication!
For example, a bee, discovering a bountiful supply of nectar thousand of meters away, will return and give directions to its fellow bees by flying in a series of complex patterns in front of the hive. The other bees will then fly straight to the food source.
Termites
Millions of blind termites are known to coordinate their labors to build and air–condition their complex structures. How do they do it? Instinctive communication!
Butterflies
Monarch butterflies are known to cover more than 3,000 kilometers by flying from Canada and then spending their winter in California or Mexico. Along the way back home they lay their eggs on milkweed plants.
When the new butterflies are born they take the same route back home from where their parents came and later amazingly before winter they are known to take the 3000 over kilometers journey to California or Mexico resting on the same groves of trees their parents rested. Its amazing isn’t it?
(From the book, The Story of Pollination)
“They are instinctively wise.” Says the bible book of Proverbs in Chapter 30 verse 24.
Ants
While some ant colonies may contain only a few dozen ants, others have a huge population running into the hundreds of thousands, and although generally of moderate size, the nest or tunneled area may grow until it is as much as an acre in size.
Within each colony there are three basic castes: the “queen” is not such in a governmental sense and more fittingly can be called the “mother” ant, for her essential function is that of egg-laying.
Whereas a “queen” ant may live as much as fifteen years, the males live only long enough to mate and then die.
The worker ants, whose life-span may reach six years, have various duties to perform, such as searching for and gathering in food for the colony, feeding the “queen,” acting as nurses for the larvae, cleaning the nest or digging new chambers as expansion is needed, and defending the nest.
Worker ants may be of different sizes and proportions; even within the same colony, in some cases the larger ones acting as “soldiers” in the event of invasion of the nest. Still, despite the fairly precise division of work and the relatively complex social organization existent, there is no sign of any superior “officer” or taskmaster.
The ‘wisdom’ of the ants is not the product of intelligent reasoning but results from the instinctive communication skills with which they endowed by their creator. Man can benefit much by learning from it.
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