Posted on 07/19/2018 9:04:30 AM PDT by BBell
For non-experts trying to comprehend Saturday's (July 14) jaguar escape at Audubon Zoo, one big question lingers -- why did he kill so many animals?
When Valerio the jaguar was discovered outside his enclosure and inside the zoo's fox exhibit at 7:20 a.m. Saturday (July 14), he had already killed six animals and seriously injured three more, who, within 48 hours, would also die. In total, one emu, three foxes and five alpacas were killed.
If Valerio was hungry, why didn't he just kill one or two animals to feed on? Was he being territorial?
That sort of logic may make sense to humans, but it isn't how jaguars are hardwired, said Dr. Aletris Neils, executive director of Conservation CATalyst, a group dedicated to protecting wild cat species around the world. Neils has spent 15 years tracking and studying jaguars in the wild, including a rare and tiny group of individual jaguars that have been spotted in Arizona.
Neils and other experts said Valerio's escape was an example of "surplus killing," which typically occurs when the hunting instinct of cats, both big and small, meets a human-altered environment. Like all cats, the jaguar's predatory instinct is "linked to movement," she said. When a jaguar is in hunting mode, movement guides how much she kills, not how hungry she is or if she is feeling territorial. Now, consider a jaguar hunting in an enclosed environment where its prey can't get away. The 3-year-old Valerio was simply acting on instinct, Neils said.
"It was completely natural behavior that is in no way reflective of a bad cat," Neils said.
Jaguars live in 18 countries, all in Latin America, from Mexico to Argentina. They are the largest big cat living in the Americas today, but are threatened by illegal hunting, deforestation and loss of
(Excerpt) Read more at nola.com ...
Because the zoo’s gumbo sux?
Because they were mocking him?
That cat is really pissed off.
When the ears good down, get the peroxide.
5.56mm
I couldn’t agree more. Being a lab,
My dog is very docile. Now that she’s figured out how to pick the tomatoes and cucumbers from the garden, I think she’s going vegan. I have zero fear when she sleeps at the foot of my bed.
Maybe he was just really ticked off.
pleasure pain principle - it was pleasurable.
minimal effort principle - they were easy to kill
So much for the lie that humans are the only predators who kill when they’re not hungry. (Your pet cat is one-being extinction factory.)
How did the jaguar kill so many without an AR-15?
Jaguar being Jaguar.
LOL!
Do you know about the Choc Mul at Chichen Itza on the Yucatan Peninsula???? ....I can’t pronounce all that crap, so no. I don’t.
Chichen Itza is an old Mayan city with temples and a huge pyramid...Has many historical and fascinating buildings and structures...
A game was played on a huge court and the WINNING captain was given the honor of sacrificing himself to the gods for a good harvest...No kidding....
Choc Mul is a statue of a reclining man with a plate on his belly...The heart of the sacrificed guy was placed on the plate and the priests would chant...Out of the jungle would come a jaguar and eat the heart...
So thats why some people stand in the line of sight between the cat and the electric can opener.
Put another way, it's plain old survival instinct kicking in, when opening the cat food, with the electric can opener, i.e., like covering the key pad as you enter your pin number for your debit card. (Do I really need to put a "/s," or will people just figure it out.) Ah what the hey, I'm covered the /s is there.
I had to stop putting out birdseed because my cats were killing the birds and the mate would chirp sadly all day in my back yard calling for their dead spouse.
It was a bummer on 2 levels.
And then the cats would lose interest, conceding the dead bird to my dogs, who would get in trouble. I think the cats did that on purpose because they hate the dogs.
Lol cats vs dogs. A very old and dangerous rivalry.
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