Becoming a Tiger: The Education of an Animal Child

by Susan McCarthy

  It’s hard to see how animals could know they’re about to give birth the first time, unless they could figure it out from seeing other animals give birth. In many species laboring mothers sneak away for a little privacy, making it unlikely that other females will witness the process. So the first-time mother will often sneak off herself because she feels unwell, go through delivery on her own, and then get the surprise of her life when confronted by her progeny, whether that consists of a foal, 14 puppies, or a big blue egg. Hard-wired parental doting will usually take care of matters from there. It is not completely unknown for humans who don’t realize they’re pregnant to go into labor and not figure out what’s happening until they spot an infant loitering about the premises, so it ill behooves our species to sneer.

  Midwifery

  In the wild, when an elephant gives birth, she is closely attended by the females in her herd, who remove the placenta, help the calf up, and caress it. Female dolphins cluster around a female giving birth and help the calf to the surface to take its first breath.

  The Rodrigues fruit bat, or golden bat, is an endangered species. At a small captive breeding colony, biologists noticed that a pregnant bat was in labor and in difficulties. An unrelated female was hanging next to her, paying close attention. The pregnant bat did not seem to understand that although bats usually hang head-down, in this case she needed to hang feet-down to let gravity assist the baby in being born. Failing that, hanging horizontally from the top of the flight cage in a “cradle” position would have been better.

  The helper licked the pregnant bat and folded her in her wings. Four times the helper left her place next to the laboring bat, moved into full view in front of her, and hung feet-down. When she did this, the mother also turned feet-down, and the helper moved back and wrapped her wings around her. The bat pup slowly began to emerge, with one foot and one wing protruding, and the helper groomed the baby and fanned the mother. “The helper continued to alternate between ‘tutoring’ the mother in a feet-down posture, grooming the emerging pup and mother, and resting.” The pup was finally born an hour and three quarters after labor began.

  Since these bats always hang head-down except to urinate or defecate or to give birth, it seems that the helper hung feet-down to give the first-time mother a hint. Had she only been doing so out of the sort of unconscious sympathetic movement that makes us flinch when we see someone take a blow, it’s hard to see why she would have moved into the mother’s view to do so.

  Meanwhile, two males in the colony didn’t get involved in the delivery, but when one of the people watching tried to take close-up photos, they moved in front of the females and threatened the photographer, spreading their wings.

  Keeping track of the baby

  Since other animals may kidnap babies, mothers must learn not to let others borrow their baby unless they’re sure they can get it back. Lorel, the biological mother of the loquacious bonobo Kanzi, had never had a baby before. Raised by humans, she didn’t know that she was entitled not to let others hold her child. When the bonobo Matata, an experienced mother with a child of her own, reached out for the 30-minute-old Kanzi, Lorel let her take him. Matata never gave him back.

  Nursing

  Suckling the young, that amazing female mammal specialty, is indispensable for the survival of babies (unless the setting is a zoo, where keepers can step in with bottles and formula). Many hand-reared apes don’t suckle their babies, because they’ve never seen it done. But they can learn. Human nursing mothers (who happened to be zookeepers) were enlisted to educate an orangutan at the Seattle Zoo. Melati, a captive-born ape with a complicated childhood, had had essentially no experience with a mother-infant situation. She ignored her first baby, and it was taken away and hand-reared. When she got pregnant again, they brought in the breast-feeding demonstrators. Melati watched with interest and “autonursed,” sucking on her own nipple, but didn’t try to imitate them by nursing an orangutan doll or, when she had her second infant, by nursing it. Instead, when the baby cried, she kissed it tenderly, and the baby sucked on her tongue. She did carry this baby nicely. Discouraged, keepers took the baby away on the third day and fed it in the nursery. Three days later, when they saw that Melati had a good milk supply, they gave the baby back. Melati had a wacky new scheme: she would autonurse, fill her mouth with milk, and then transfer the milk to the baby’s mouth. On the ninth day they finally worked it out: Melati held the baby to her bosom, the baby nursed, and the zookeepers sighed with relief.

  Large sea mammal mothers in captivity must keep their babies—who can swim vigorously—from bashing against the walls of the tank. Alexandra Morton describes the tragic outcome when Corky, a captive killer whale, carefully interposed her head between her new calf and the tank wall every time it approached. To nurse, killer whale calves must locate the mammary slit, which is marked by a white spot under the whale’s tail. But killer whales (also called orcas) have white spots behind their eyes, too. The calf kept nuzzling Corky’s eyespot. “This led us to believe that baby orcas are led by instinct toward a white spot, much as a seagull chick pecks at the red spot on its mother’s beak. Because Corky constantly had to use her head to push the baby away from the circular tank edge, however, the baby had fixated on the wrong white spot—the one behind her eye,” writes Morton. The calf never succeeded in suckling and was removed, but humans failed to raise it. In the wild the other females in the pod would probably have guided the baby to the right spot, but when a diver bravely entered the tank to try to perform this service, Corky was so worried by the sight of a human gripping her child that she perpetually swung her face, with its alluring white spot, toward the calf.

  Weaning

  Young mammals must eventually be weaned, but they often disapprove. Sociobiologists have produced theoretical analyses of how the parent’s interests conflict with the offspring’s interests, but it all boils down to the offspring seeing no reason why a good thing should end and the mothers being sick and tired of nursing these great louts.

  Biruté Galdikas describes the incessant tantrums of Mel, a five-year-old orangutan of formerly sunny temperament, when his mother Maud was weaning him. He would add emphasis to his discontent by hanging upside down from a branch by his feet while screaming at the top of his lungs and punching the air wildly.

  Primatologist Toshisada Nishida describes a chimpanzee mother when weaning. “She shakes off her youngster when it tries to ride on her back, and prevents it from suckling by folding her arms in front of her breasts or by lying prone on the ground.” Five-year-old Katabi was being weaned by Chausiku. His display of hysterics included hanging by one foot and banging his head against the tree trunk, shaking and screaming. Nishida noticed the seemingly distraught Katabi sneaking glances at Chausiku to see if she was relenting.

  Faustino, a chimpanzee child at Gombe, felt deprived of attention when his mother Fifi had another baby. He threw constant tantrums. One day Fifi climbed high into a tree with her two children and tossed Faustino out of the tree—except that she held on to his ankle so that he dangled, screaming. He did not have any tantrums for the rest of the day. Jane Goodall saw it happen again on another day, and again Faustino was subdued for the rest of the day.

  Not all ape mothers are so emphatic in their discipline. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh describes the bonobo Matata being called to intervene in the trials of her son Kanzi. Savage-Rumbaugh and Kanzi might be squabbling over whether Kanzi should pick up her papers, which he had just grabbed and flung on the floor. Kanzi would yell for Matata. She would “lumber over with a suspicious look on her face and attempt to determine what was going on between me and Kanzi.” Both primates would appeal to Matata to see the justice of their position. Often Matata did not see things as Savage-Rumbaugh did. Toilet training, for example: Matata, who was not toilet-trained, and who had never known a bonobo who was, could not see what Savage-Rumbaugh was getting at, “apparently assuming that sitting on the potty was an unusual form of punishment that I had inven
ted for her son.” When even his mother felt that Kanzi needed to be reined in, Matata would take his hand or foot in her mouth and slowly increase her pressure until he realized that she was serious, and behaved himself.

  Becoming better parents

  One of the main responsibilities of parents is safety—keeping kids from being eaten, keeping them from falling off cliffs and out of trees, and keeping them from eating poison. Chimpanzee mothers and older siblings do not like to see babies putting strange things in their mouths, and if they see them with a novel food item, they will snatch or flick it away from them. The chimpanzee mother FT thought it was a bad idea when she saw nine-month-old PN reaching for ficus leaves, so she moved PN’s hand away. Stubborn PN grabbed more leaves, so FT took the leaves out of PN’s hand, picked all the ficus leaves in reach, and dropped them to the ground.

  Keeping children from being eaten is one of the most pressing concerns for many animals. Young animals are easy to catch, tender, and bite-sized, so predators focus on them. Bonnie and Clyde, whooping cranes who had triumphed over their own irregular childhoods (they were raised by biologists in crane outfits) and built a happy home next to a lake in Florida, successfully hatched two chicks. One day, both first-time parents had stepped away from the nest, and a bald eagle swooped down and grabbed a chick. When it came back for the second chick, Bonnie covered it with her wings, and Clyde leapt at the eagle and frightened it off. Observers promptly named the chick Lucky. Two months later, when Lucky had even more meat on his bones, a pair of eagles came by, and the incensed Bonnie and Clyde went after them so fiercely that one eagle had to spend two weeks in rehab.

  Mares also become better parents as they get older. In wild populations, a higher proportion of the foals born to older mares survive. Studies of feral horses living in the Kaimanawa ranges of New Zealand found that older mares didn’t work any harder at it than younger mares, but they targeted their care more successfully. The older mares were more attentive and doting when their foals were very young (under three weeks) and less so when the foals were older. Older mares let their very young foals nurse longer and put more effort into maintaining contact with them. This seemed to be the result of experience—younger mares who had lost a foal changed their behavior with the next foal and acted more like the older mares.

  Whether older parents are more successful parents has been studied in monogamous birds. There may be two effects here: individuals in a pair may be better at raising a family, or they may be better as a pair. The effects are clearest in swans, which are long-lived. Although they mate for life, mortality is high, so old and experienced animals who have been widowed are found in new pairs with inexperienced young birds. By studying enough pairs, researchers found that older Bewick’s swans are better parents, even when mated to younger swans. But they also found that the longer a pair had been together, the better they did. By their calculations, Bewick’s swan pairs get better for 11 years and then, apparently, they are the best parents Bewick’s swans can possibly be.

  Barnacle geese—remember them and their trial marriages?—also improve their teamwork over the first seven years they are together. Perhaps they get better at coordinating their incubation and foraging duties, and perhaps they are better at presenting a united front to other goose couples and grabbing the best nesting sites.

  In Chilkat Pass, willow ptarmigans who stay together for three years hatch out more chicks than newlyweds. On offshore Pacific islands, Cassin’s auklets who’ve been together forever (okay, seven years) do no better at laying eggs early, hatching out chicks, or producing big chicks, but excel at keeping chicks alive. Red-billed gulls that have been together for at least five years manage affairs so smoothly that their eggs are laid an average of nine days earlier in the season. They get better, drier nest sites, are feeding their babies when food’s most abundant, and even have time to nest again if anything bad happens to the first eggs.

  As for Adelie penguins, they do better if they stick with their old mate—but what if he or she doesn’t show up at the breeding ground? It’s important to start promptly, and you can’t be waiting around, dressed in your tux, looking at your watch, while all the best mates and nest sites are being snatched up. Thus ornithologists calculate that the best plan, if you are an Adelie, is to show up on the breeding ground as early as possible, go to the spot where you and your mate were so happy last year, and do your best to line up a nice mate at once. If last year’s mate shows up, dump the new one, and rekindle the old flame—you’ll raise more chicks if you do.

  Older men, older women

  In many bird and animal species older mates are in higher demand than novices. (Avital and Jablonka prefer to speak of a preference for middle-aged mates, since they feel that few creatures are attracted to actual dotards.) European sparrowhawks will not choose yearlings as mates unless there is no one else available, and it’s true that they will fledge more chicks with an older bird. Jane Goodall has written of the powerful allure the chimpanzee matriarch Flo held for male chimpanzees despite her grizzled hair, worn teeth, and tattered ears. Many male chimps came to Goodall’s camp for the first time when Flo was in estrus and they couldn’t bear to let her out of their sight. One researcher looked at the choices of adult male chimpanzees when they encountered two females who were each in this desirable condition. In 30 out of 38 times, the male approached the older female.

  Helpers

  Some young Seychelles warblers stuck around to help their parents take care of the next clutch; they got helping experience and had better reproductive success when they started their own families. Both males and females did better if they had helping or breeding experience. Females do most of the nest building in this species, and inexperienced females had a fatal tendency to build nests that were anchored to a branch and a thin leaf stalk, as opposed to the stout branch forks selected by experienced types. Nests not in forks were destroyed by gusty winds and heavy downpours. Male birds with experience did a better job of guarding the nest from skinks and fodies.

  In some pinyon jay families, teenagers, especially male teenagers, help out with their younger brothers and sisters, and in some they do not. The choice seems to be learned, for a pinyon jay from a nonhelping lineage fostered into a helpful-lineage nest became a delightfully helpful young bird.

  Several related species of voles have very different family lives. Meadow voles, for example, are promiscuous, do not form pairs, and leave all child care to the mother. Prairie voles pair up and cleave unto one another, and the fathers do everything that the mothers do for the children except nurse them. They huddle over them, groom them, and retrieve them if they wander off. Older children stay in the family and help raise their younger brothers and sisters. The more devoted the father vole, the more time the teenagers spend helping out. These prairie voles who help with their younger siblings are excellent parents when they breed and spend more time with their kids. Their kids grow faster and are bigger when they are weaned.

  If you take baby meadow voles (the promiscuous children of single mothers, remember) and have them raised by prairie voles, they will grow up to form pairs and the males will be devoted fathers. Perhaps they act this way because they have learned to act this way; perhaps they act this way because the presence of a father in their childhood affected their hormone levels; and perhaps both things are true.

  Teaching

  Whether animals teach things to each other (and this mostly means teaching the children) is another of those quarrelsome areas in animal behavior. Some take the view that animals do teach in certain ways, and others take the view that what those animals are doing isn’t really teaching.

  What is it to teach? When is teaching others simply enabling them to learn? If you let others watch you perform a difficult task, is that teaching? If you set up the task for them to perform and let them try, is that teaching? If you set up the task in simplified form for them to try, is that teaching? If you tell them what to do, but don’t demonstrate, is that tea
ching? If you physically orient their body so they can do it better, is that teaching? If you give them a book that explains what to do and yell at them until they read it, is that teaching?

  An influential article by T. M. Caro and M. D. Hauser, “Is There Teaching in Nonhuman Animals?” takes an inclusive view of teaching, describing three forms: opportunity teaching, coaching, and active teaching. This is their basic definition of teaching.

  An individual actor A can be said to teach if it modifies its behavior only in the presence of a naive observer, B, at some cost or at least without obtaining an immediate benefit for itself. A’s behavior thereby encourages or punishes B’s behavior, or provides B with experience, or sets an example for B. As a result, B acquires knowledge or learns a skill earlier in life or more rapidly or efficiently than it might otherwise do, or that it would not learn at all.

  By this definition, all of the above examples except simply allowing someone to watch you do something you were going to do anyway qualify as teaching.

  Opportunity teaching is giving others a chance they wouldn’t otherwise have to learn something. When a mother cheetah brings a gazelle fawn to her cubs and releases it for them to catch, that’s an opportunity they wouldn’t otherwise have.

  In coaching, the coach watches what the other animal is doing and encourages the right moves and discourages the wrong ones. Young vervet monkeys learn to improve the precision of their innate alarm calls, so they eventually give an eagle call only for an eagle or hawk, and not for a dove or a falling leaf. When they give the correct alarm call they may be encouraged by the fact that other vervets follow up by giving alarm calls. Perhaps these vervets would have given that call anyway, so they’re not really coaching. But sometimes a little vervet gives an alarm call for the wrong thing and frightens its mother. When its mother sees that she hid from a dove and not an eagle, she is apt to slap the baby—that’s coaching.