Mother deer that grieve?
Horses that feel shame?
Squirrels that adopt their grandchildren?
We humans tend to assume that we are the only living things able to experience feelings intensely and consciously. But have you ever wondered what’s going on in an animal’s head?
From the leafy forest floor to the inside of a bee hive, The Inner Life of Animals takes us from microscopic levels of observation to the big philosophical, ethical and scientific questions. We hear the stories of a grateful humpback whale, of a hedgehog who has nightmares, and of a magpie who commits adultery; we meet bees that plan for the future, pigs who learn their own names and crows that go tobogganing for fun. And at last we find out why wasps exist.
As more and more researchers are discovering, animals experience a rich emotional life that is ready to be explored. The Inner Life of Animals will show you these living things in a new light and will open up the animal kingdom like never before.
Peter Wohlleben spent over twenty years working for the forestry commission in Germany before leaving to put his ideas of ecology into practice. He now runs an environmentally-friendly woodland in Germany, where he is working towards the return of primeval forests, as well as caring for both wild and domestic animals.
Wohlleben has been celebrated for his distinctive approach to writing about nature; he brings to life groundbreaking scientific research through his observations of nature and the animals he lives amongst. He is also the author of the international bestseller The Hidden Life of Trees.
Also by Peter Wohlleben
The Hidden Life of Trees:
What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World
ROOSTERS THAT DECEIVE their hens? Mother deer that grieve? Horses that feel shame? Up until just a few years ago, such ideas would have sounded absurd, mere wishful thinking on the part of animal lovers who wanted to feel closer to their charges. I’ve been around animals all my life and I was one of those dreamers. Whether it was the chick in my parents’ garden that picked me out as its mum, the goat at our forest lodge that brightened our days with her contented bleating or the animals I met on my daily rounds of the woodland that I manage, I often wondered what was going on inside their heads. Is it really true, as scientists have long maintained, that people are the only animals capable of enjoying a full range of emotions? Has Creation really engineered a unique biological path for us? Are we the only ones guaranteed a life of self-awareness and satisfaction?
If that were the case, you wouldn’t be reading this book. If human beings were the result of some special biological design, we wouldn’t be able to compare ourselves to other animals. It would make no sense to talk about empathy with them, because we would not be able even to begin to imagine how they felt. Luckily, Nature opted for the economy plan. Evolution ‘only’ modifies and builds on whatever is already available, much like a computer system. And so, just as code from earlier operating systems is integrated into the latest Windows program, the genetic programming of our ancient ancestors still works in us – and in all the other species whose family trees branched off from our lineage in the past few million years. And so, as I see it, there is only one kind of grief, pain or love. It might sound presumptuous to say that a pig feels things just as we do, but there is a vanishingly small chance that an injury hurts a pig less than it hurts us. ‘Aha,’ the scientists might interject at this point, ‘but we have no proof.’ That’s true, but there never will be any proof. I can’t even prove that you feel the same way as I do. No one can look inside another person and prove that, say, the prick of a pin triggers the same sensation in each one of the seven billion people on this planet. But we are able to express our feelings in words, and this ability to share increases the probability that people operate on roughly the same level when it comes to feelings.
So when our dog Maxi polished off a bowl of dumplings in the kitchen and then looked up at us with an innocent expression on her face, she was not behaving like a biological eating machine; she was behaving like the shrewd and endearing little rascal she was. The more often and the more closely I paid attention, the more I noticed our pets and their wild woodland relatives displaying what are supposed to be exclusively human emotions. And I am not alone in this. More and more researchers are realising that humans and many animals have things in common. True love among ravens? No question. Squirrels who know the names of their close relatives? That’s been documented for a long time. Wherever you look, animals are out there, loving each other, feeling each other’s pain and enjoying each other’s company.
Currently there’s a great deal of scientific research on the inner lives of animals, although it’s usually so narrowly focused and written in such dry, academic language that it hardly makes for gripping reading and, more importantly, rarely leads to a better understanding of the subject. And that’s why I would like to act as your interpreter and translate fascinating scientific research into everyday language for you, assemble the individual pieces of the puzzle so that you can see the big picture, and sprinkle in a few observations of my own to bring it all to life. I hope this will help you see the animal world around you, and the species described in this book, not as mindless automatons driven by an inflexible genetic code, but as stalwart souls and lovable rascals. And that is just what they are, as you will discover for yourself when you take a walk in my neighbourhood with my goats, horses and rabbits, or in the parks and woods where you live. Come on. I’ll show you what I mean.
IT WAS A hot summer day at my forester’s lodge deep in the woods near Hümmel in the Eifel, a mountain range in Germany. The year was 1996. To cool off, my wife and I had set out a wading pool under a shady tree in the garden. I was sitting in the water with my two children and we were enjoying juicy slices of watermelon when, all of a sudden, I became aware of a movement out of the corner of my eye. A rusty brown something was scampering towards us, freezing for an instant every now and then as it advanced. ‘A squirrel!’ the children cried in delight. My joy, however, soon turned to deep concern as the squirrel took a few more steps and then keeled over onto its side. It was clearly ill, and after it had taken a few more steps – in our direction! – I noticed a large growth on its neck. It looked like an animal that was suffering from something and might even be highly infectious. Slowly but surely, it was approaching the pool. I was on the point of gathering up the children and beating a hasty retreat when the menacing advance resolved itself into a touching scene. The lump turned out to be a baby squirrel wrapped around its mother’s neck like a furry ruff. The baby’s stranglehold, along with the shimmering heat, meant that the squirrel mother could only suck in enough air to take a few steps before falling over sideways, exhausted and gasping for breath.
A squirrel mother cares for her children with selfless devotion. When danger threatens, she carries them to safety in the manner I have just described. She can end up totally spent, because she may have as many as six tiny tots to carry, one after the other, each one clasped around her neck. Despite her devotion, the chances of her little ones surviving are low, and about 80 per cent die before they are a year old. Although the rusty rascals can avoid most enemies during the day, death stalks them at night while they are sleeping. When darkness falls, predatory pine martens creep through the branches to interrupt the squirrels’ dreams. When the sun shines, the danger comes from agile hawks threading their way through the trees on the lookout for a tasty meal. When a hawk spots a squirrel, a spiral of fear begins. And I mean that literally, for the squirrel tries to escape the hawk by disappearing to the other side of the tree. The hawk banks steeply to follow its prey. In a flash, the squirrel disappears to the other side of the tree again. The hawk follows. Moving at breakneck speed, both animals spiral around the trunk. The nimbler one wins – usually the little mammal.
Winter, however, is more devastating than any predator. To make sure they go into the cold season well prepared, squirrels build dreys. They anchor these spherical nests between branches high up in tree crowns, and fashion two separate exits with their paws so that they can escape any uninvited guests. The nest is made mostly of small twigs, and the interior is cushioned with soft moss that helps conserve heat and provides a comfortable place to sleep. Comfortable? Yes, animals value comfort, too, and squirrels don’t like twigs poking into their backs while they’re trying to sleep any more than we do. A soft moss mattress guarantees a restful night.
From my office window, I regularly see squirrels pulling this soft green material from our lawn and carrying it high up into the branches. And I see something else, too. As soon as the acorns and beechnuts tumble to the ground in autumn, squirrels gather these nutrient-rich packages, carry them a few metres and bury them. They hide these food caches to ensure they have food over the winter. Instead of going into true hibernation, they spend most of their winter days dozing. In this state of winter lethargy, they use less energy than usual, but they do not shut down completely like, say, hedgehogs. Every once in a while, a squirrel wakes up and gets hungry. Then it slips down the tree and looks for one of its numerous caches. And it looks, and looks, and looks. At first it’s funny watching the little animal trying to remember where it has hidden its food. It burrows a bit here, digs a little there, sitting upright every once in a while as though taking a break to think. But that doesn’t help. The landscape has changed considerably since the autumn. The trees and shrubs have lost their leaves, the grass has dried up and, worse, everything might now be covered in cottony-white snow. As the frantic squirrel continues its search, my heart goes out to it. Nature is ruthlessly sorting out who will live and who will die. Most of the forgetful squirrels – primarily this year’s young – will not live to see spring because they will starve to death. Then I find small clumps of beech trees sprouting in the ancient beech preserves. Baby beeches look like emerald-coloured butterflies fluttering at the ends of slender stalks and they usually grow alone. They gather in clumps only in places where a squirrel has failed to retrieve the nuts it stashed, often because it simply forgot where they were, with the fatal consequences I have just described.
I find the red squirrel to be a prime example of how we sort animals into categories. Their dark button-eyes are adorable, their soft fur is a beautiful reddish colour (there are also some that are brownish-black) and they pose no threat to humans. In spring, young trees sprout from their forgotten food caches, so you could say they help to establish new woodlands. In short, we are kindly disposed towards them. We avoid thinking about their favourite food: baby birds. From my office window at the lodge, I am also privy to their predatory raids. When a squirrel scales a tree in spring, consternation reigns in the small colony of fieldfares that raise their young in the old pines along the driveway. The little birds, which are related to thrushes, flutter around the trees, chittering and chattering, trying to drive off the intruder. Squirrels are the birds’ deadly enemies, because the little mammals calmly help themselves to one downy chick after another. Even nesting cavities offer the baby birds only limited protection. Armed with long, sharp claws at the end of slender paws, squirrels can fish even supposedly well-protected nestlings out of the tree hollows where they are hiding.
So are squirrels bad or are they good? Neither. A quirk of Nature ensures that they arouse our protective instincts, and so we experience positive emotions when we see them. This has nothing to do with them being good or useful. And on the flip side of the coin, their habit of killing the songbirds we also love doesn’t mean they are bad, either. The squirrels are hungry and must feed their young, which depend on nourishing milk from their mother. We would be thrilled if squirrels met their need for protein by gorging themselves on the caterpillars of the cabbage-white butterfly. If they did this, our emotional balance sheet would come out 100 per cent in the squirrels’ favour, because these pests are a nuisance in our vegetable gardens. But caterpillars are also young animals, and in this case they grow up to be butterflies. And just because the caterpillars happen to like the plants we have earmarked for our dinner doesn’t mean that killing butterfly babies counts as a net benefit for the natural world. The squirrels, meanwhile, are not the slightest bit interested in what we think of them. They are too busy surviving and, while they are at it, making the most of life.
But back to maternal love in these little red scamps. Are they really capable of experiencing this emotion? A love so strong that a squirrel mother places a higher value on the lives of her offspring than she does on her own? Isn’t it just a case of a spike in the hormones coursing through the squirrel’s veins that triggers pre-programmed protective behaviour? Science has a tendency to reduce biological processes to involuntary mechanics, and so, before painting such a dispassionate picture of squirrels and other animals, let’s take a look at maternal love in our own species. What happens in a human mother’s body when she holds an infant in her arms? Is maternal love innate? Science would say: yes and no. Maternal love itself is not innate, but the conditions necessary for developing this love are.
Shortly before a child is born, the hormone oxytocin flows through the mother’s system, which helps her develop a strong bond with her child. In addition, large quantities of endorphins – one of the so-called ‘feel-good’ chemicals – are released, which dull pain and reduce anxiety. This cocktail of hormones remains in the mother’s bloodstream after the birth of her child, ensuring that the baby is welcomed into the world by a mother who is relaxed and in a positive mood. Nursing stimulates further production of oxytocin, and the mother– child bond intensifies. The same thing happens in many animals, including the goats that my family and I keep at our forest lodge. Goat mothers also produce oxytocin. A mother goat starts getting acquainted with her kids when she licks off the mucus that covers her babies after birth. The clean-up process intensifies their bond, and as the mother goat bleats softly to her children, her offspring reply in thin, reedy voices and the vocal signatures are imprinted in both mother and kids.
Things do not go well if something goes awry at clean-up time. When a mother goat in our small herd is ready to give birth, we put her in a pen of her own so that she can deliver her kids in peace. There is a small gap under the door of the stall, and once during a birth a particularly small kid slipped out under it. By the time we noticed the mishap, precious time had passed and the mucus covering the kid had already dried. The result? Despite our best efforts, the mother goat refused to accept her baby. The time to trigger mother love had passed.
Something similar can happen with people. If a mother in hospital is separated from her newborn baby for an extended period of time, the maternal bond becomes more difficult to establish. The situation is not as dramatic as it is with goats, because humans are not totally dependent on hormones and can learn how to love. If we were like goats, adoptions would never work out, because adoptive mothers often meet their children years after their birth. Adoption, therefore, is the best opportunity we have for investigating whether maternal love is more than just an instinctive reflex and something that can be learned. But before we tackle this question, I would like to shine some light on instincts and how they work.
I OFTEN HEAR that there’s no point comparing animal emotions to human emotions, because animals act and feel instinctively, whereas humans act consciously. Before we turn to the question of whether instinctive behaviour is second-rate, let’s take a closer look at instincts. Science uses the term ‘instinctive behaviour’ to describe actions that are carried out unconsciously, without being subjected to any thought processes. These actions can be genetically hard-wired or they can be learned. What is common to all of them is that they happen very quickly because they bypass cognitive processes in the brain. Often these actions are the result of hormones released at certain times (in moments of anger, for example), which then trigger physical responses. So are animals nothing more than biological automatons on autopilot?
Before rushing to judgement, let’s consider our own species. We are not free of instinctive behaviour ourselves. Quite the opposite, in fact. Think about a hot element on an electric stove. If you were to absent-mindedly put your hand on one, you’d take it away again in a flash. There’s no preceding conscious reflection, no internal monologue along the lines of ‘That’s strange. It smells like someone’s barbecuing something and my hand suddenly really hurts. I’d better remove it.’ You just react automatically without making a conscious decision to remove your hand. So people behave instinctively, too. The question is simply the extent to which instincts determine what we do every day.
To shed some light on the matter, let’s turn to recent studies of the brain. The Max Planck Institute in Leipzig published the results of an astonishing study carried out in 2008. With the help of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), which translates brain activity into digital images, test subjects were observed making decisions: whether to push the computer button with their right hand or with their left. The activity in their brains clearly showed what their choices were going to be, up to seven seconds before the test subjects themselves were aware of them. This means that the behaviour had already been initiated while the volunteers were still considering what to do. And so it follows that it was the unconscious part of the brain that triggered the action. It seems that what the conscious part of the brain did was to come up with an explanation for the action a few seconds later.1
Research into these kinds of processes is still very new, and so it’s impossible to say what percentage and what kinds of decisions work this way, or whether we’re capable of rejecting processes set in motion unconsciously. But still, it’s amazing to think that so-called free will is often playing catch-up. All the conscious part of the brain is doing in this case is coming up with a face-saving explanation for our fragile ego, which, thanks to this reassurance, feels it’s completely in control at all times. In many cases, however, the other side – our unconscious – is in charge of operations.
In the end, it doesn’t really matter how much our intellect is consciously in control. Despite the fact that a surprising number of our reactions are probably instinctive, our experiences of fear and grief, joy and happiness are not at all diminished by being triggered instinctively, instead of being actively instigated. Their origin doesn’t reduce their intensity in any way. The point is that emotions are the language of the unconscious and, in day-to-day life, they prevent us from sinking beneath an overwhelming flood of information. The pain in your hand when you put it on a hot element allows you to react immediately. Feeling happy reinforces positive behaviours. Fear saves you from embarking on a course of action that could be dangerous. Only the relatively few problems that actually can, and should, be solved by thinking them through make it to the conscious level of our brain, where they can be analysed at leisure.
Basically then, emotions are linked to the unconscious part of the brain, not the conscious part. If animals lacked consciousness, all that would mean is that they would be unable to have thoughts. But every species of animal experiences unconscious brain activity, and because this activity directs how the animal interacts with the world, every animal necessarily has emotions. Therefore instinctive maternal love cannot be second-rate, because no other kind of maternal love exists. The only difference between animals and people is that we can consciously activate maternal love (and other emotions); for example, in the case of adoption, where there can be no question of an instinctive bond created between mother and child at birth because first contact often happens much later on. Yet here, too, instinctive maternal love develops over time and the accompanying hormone cocktail flows through the mother’s bloodstream.
Aha! Have we finally successfully isolated a human emotional domain that animals cannot enter? Let’s take another look at our red squirrel. Canadian researchers have been watching its relatives in the Yukon for more than twenty years. About 7,000 animals took part in the study and, although red squirrels are solitary animals, five adoptions were observed. Admittedly, each case involved squirrel babies of a close family member being raised by another female. Only nieces, nephews or grandchildren were adopted, which shows that squirrel altruism has its limits. From a purely evolutionary standpoint, there are advantages to this arrangement, because it means very closely related genetic material is preserved and handed down, although it has to be said that five cases in twenty years is not exactly overwhelming proof of an adoption-friendly attitude in squirrels.2 So let’s take a look at some other species.
What about dogs? In 2012 a French bulldog called Baby hit the headlines. Baby lived in an animal sanctuary in Brandenburg, Germany. One day, six baby wild boar were brought in. The sow had probably been shot by hunters, and the tiny striped piglets wouldn’t have stood a chance on their own. At the sanctuary the animals got full-fat milk – and full-on love. The milk came from the carers’ bottles, but the love and warmth came from Baby. The bulldog adopted the whole crew right away and allowed the piglets to sleep snuggled up to her. She also kept a watchful eye on the little tykes during the day.3 But could that be called a true adoption? After all, Baby didn’t nurse the piglets. But nursing is not a necessary component of human adoptions, either, and yet there are reports of dogs who even did that. A Cuban dog, Yeti, had just given birth to a litter of puppies, which meant she had a lot of milk. When a few pigs on the farm also had babies, Yeti lost no time adopting fourteen piglets, even though their own mothers were still around. The little piglets followed their new mum around the farmyard and, of most importance here, Yeti nursed them.4 Was that an example of conscious adoption? Or did Yeti just have maternal instincts to spare? We could ask these same questions of human adoptions, where people with strong desires look for and find an outlet for them. You could even liken the keeping of dogs and other pets to interspecies adoption; after all, some four-legged friends are accepted into human society almost as though they are members of the family.
There are other cases, however, where super-abundant hormones or surplus milk can be ruled out as the driving forces behind adoption. The crow called Moses is a touching example. When birds lose their brood, Nature gives them another opportunity to work off their pent-up impulses. They can simply start anew and lay another clutch of eggs. There’s no way a single bird like Moses can exercise its maternal instincts, yet Moses attempted to do just this. The target of Moses’ attention was a potential enemy – a house-cat, albeit an extremely small and relatively helpless one, because the kitten had obviously lost its mother and had not had anything to eat in a long time. The little stray popped up in Ann and Wally Collito’s garden. The couple lived in a cottage in North Attleborough, Massachusetts, and they watched in amazement at what happened next. The crow attached itself to the little orphan and was clearly looking after it, feeding it with earthworms and beetles. Of course the Collitos didn’t just stand by and watch; they fed the kitten, as well. The friendship between the crow and the cat continued after the cat grew up, and it lasted until Moses disappeared five years later.5
But let’s get back to instincts. In my opinion, it makes no difference whether a mother’s love is triggered by unconscious commands or comes after conscious deliberation. At the end of the day, it feels just the same. What is clear is that people are capable of both, although instinctive love triggered by hormones is more common. Even if animals are not capable of consciously developing maternal feelings – and the adoption of animals across species barriers should make us rethink that one – instinctive maternal love remains, and it is just as moving and just as compelling. The squirrel that crossed our lawn in a haze of heat with a baby wrapped around her neck was motivated by deep devotion. And, when I think back on that day, knowing that makes the experience all the more beautiful.
CAN ANIMALS REALLY love us? We’ve already seen, in the case of squirrels, just how difficult it can be to verify this feeling between animals of the same species. But to now add love across the species divide – and all the way to us humans? You’ve got to wonder whether this is simply wishful thinking to make it easier for us to justify imprisoning our pets. First, let’s take another look at the mother–child bond, because this particularly strong kind of love is something we can actually trigger in animals, as I experienced when I was a boy.
Even back then, my interests revolved around nature and the environment, and I spent every spare moment outside in the woods or at lakes in abandoned quarry pits along the Rhine. I imitated the calls of frogs to get them to respond, kept a few spiders in glass jars so that I could observe them, and raised mealworms in flour to watch them turn into black beetles. In the evening I curled up with books about behavioural biology (don’t worry, books by adventure writers such as Karl May and Jack London also had their place by my bed). In one of them, I read that you can get chicks to imprint on people. All you had to do was incubate an egg and talk to it just before it hatched, so that the tiny creature inside became imprinted on a human instead of a hen. Apparently, the relationship lasted a lifetime. How exciting!
At the time, my father kept a few hens and a rooster in the garden, so I had access to fertilised eggs. I didn’t have an incubator, so an old electric blanket had to do. There was one other problem. Chicken eggs need to be kept at 38 degrees Celsius and turned often every day, so that they can cool down a bit. Armed with a scarf and a thermometer, I had to painstakingly simulate behaviour that comes naturally to a hen. For twenty-one days I measured the egg’s temperature, draped varying layers of scarf over it and carefully turned it. A few days before the estimated date of hatching, I began my monologues. And then it happened. Punctually on the twenty-first day a small packet of fluff pecked its way to freedom. I immediately christened it Robin Hood.
The chick was incredibly adorable. Its yellow feathers were sprinkled with tiny black spots and its black button-eyes gazed straight at me. It never wanted to leave my side, and every time it lost sight of me, it began to cheep frantically. It didn’t matter if I was on the toilet, in front of the television or in bed, Robin was always there. The only time I left the little chick alone was when I went to school. Then I took my leave with a heavy heart, and I was greeted effusively when I returned. But this intimate bond began to stress me out. My brother took pity on me and cared for the chick part-time so that I could do something without Robin every once in a while. Eventually, however, it became too much for him as well. By now, Robin had developed into a young hen, and we gave it to a retired English teacher who was very fond of animals. Man and hen became fast friends, and for a long time you could see the two of them taking walks together in the neighbouring village: the teacher on foot, with Robin riding on his shoulder.
I think it’s safe to say that Robin established a genuine relationship with its human carers, and many people can share similar stories about being a substitute parent for a young animal. The bottle-fed kids my wife hand-raises, for example, remain extremely attached to her for life. Here and in other cases, human carers play the role of adoptive mothers, and the stories are always heart-warming. However, these relationships are not voluntary – at least not as far as the animals are concerned, even if they have to thank their carers for their survival. It would be more meaningful if an animal were to come and stay with us of its own accord. But has this ever happened?
To find out, we must leave the warm embrace of maternal love and cast a wider net. What we’re looking for is a scenario where an animal can grow up and decide for itself whether it will stay or leave. There’s a good reason most dogs and cats come to us as babies, because that removes the element of choice for the little scamps. And that’s absolutely a good thing. After a few days of getting used to their new circumstances – and possibly after a twinge of anxiety at being separated from their mother – young animals just a few weeks old quickly get attached to their carers and, exactly like my wife’s bottle-fed kids, they remain particularly close to them for as long as they live. Everyone feels good, but there’s still that nagging question: are there any adult animals that enter into relationships with people of their own free will?
For house-pets, the answer is a resounding yes. There are countless examples of stray cats and dogs that practically force themselves on caring humans. But in answering this question, I’d prefer to explore the world of wild animals, because wild animals have not had tameness bred into them and are therefore not predisposed to seeking a connection with people. And I’d like to exclude one more scenario: using food to tame animals. When wild animals are offered food, the only thing they want to do is eat and therefore they tolerate, and to a certain extent get used to, our presence. Our former neighbours found out what a nuisance this can be when they started feeding a squirrel. For weeks they had been tempting the little rascal with nuts, and it had practically become a member of the family. But if the human food dispenser wasn’t there in a timely manner every day, the squirrel would start scratching impatiently at the window. It demolished the frame in just a few weeks; and squirrel claws are razor-sharp.
Most friendships between wild animals and people are to be found in the sea, with dolphins. Fungie, who lives in Dingle Bay in Ireland, is a particular star. He pops up often, accompanies tour boats and shows off for visitors. He’s become a real tourist magnet and features in official travel brochures. People who feel moved to do so can safely get into the water with him. The sizeable dolphin swims alongside them, and they experience a special kind of joy in his presence. His tameness doesn’t depend on food, which he refuses to accept. Fungie has been around for more than thirty years now, and it’s difficult to imagine life in Dingle without him. Most people find his story delightful – but not everyone. A reporter for the German newspaper Die Welt interviewed scientists and asked whether the dolphin might not simply be deranged. Perhaps, the reporter asked, the solitary animal hangs out with people only because he’s shunned by others of his kind?6
Apart from the fact that people often form friendships with animals for similar reasons – for example, because they are lonely after the loss of a partner – I would like to investigate the question further with land-based animals closer to home. And that’s not easy, because a common characteristic of wild animals is that they are exactly that – wild – and therefore they normally don’t seek contact with people. Moreover, people have hunted them for tens of thousands of years, so they have evolved to be wary of humans; those that don’t escape in time are in danger of losing their lives. And that is still the case for many animals, as you can see just by running your eye down the list of animals that it’s still legal to hunt. Whether they are large game such as deer or wild boar, or smaller four-footed targets such as foxes or hares, or even birds, from raptors to geese and ducks or snipe, every year thousands upon thousands meet their end in a hail of bullets. Thus a certain mistrust on the part of anything on two legs is completely understandable. And that is why we are so moved when such a creature overcomes its natural wariness and seeks contact with us.
What might motivate a wild animal to do that? Let’s dismiss attracting them with food, because then we don’t know whether it’s just a case of hunger over-riding fear. There is another driving force, however – one that is important for people as well – and that is curiosity. My wife, Miriam, and I had the good fortune to encounter at least one curious species: reindeer in Lapland. Okay, the reindeer are not completely wild, because the indigenous people, the Sami, own the animals and herd them with helicopters and all-terrain vehicles when they want to sort them for butchering or branding. Yet despite this, the reindeer have retained their wild character and are usually very wary around people.
Miriam and I were camping in the mountains in Sarek National Park, and because I am an early riser by nature, I was the first to creep out of my sleeping bag in the morning. I had been gazing for a while at the breathtaking sight of Nature untouched by human hands when I suddenly became aware of movement close by. A reindeer! Just the one? No, there were more coming down the slope, and I woke Miriam so that she could watch the animals as well. As we ate breakfast, more and more reindeer gathered round, until we were surrounded by the whole herd – about 300 animals. The reindeer spent all day around our tent, and one young calf even dared to get within a few metres, so that it could lie down by the tent for a midday nap. We felt we were in paradise.
When a small group of hikers walked by, we realised how wary of people these animals really were. As soon as the hikers appeared, the herd retreated, only to return a while later to the area around our tent. It was clear that some of them were very interested in us. Eyes wide open and nostrils flared, they tried to figure us out. For us, it was the most amazing experience of the whole trip. We had no idea why the reindeer were so trusting around us. Perhaps our body language was calmer than usual for humans, because of our daily interactions with animals, and that made us seem less threatening.
Anyone can have similar interactions in places where animals are not hunted. In national parks in Africa, for instance, or on the Galapagos Islands, or out on the tundra in the far north – places where species have not yet had bad experiences with people – animals allow visitors to get very close to them. And every once in a while there are some individuals that are curious enough to want to check out the unusual guests wandering about in their territory. These are the encounters that make people particularly happy, because here both parties meet completely voluntarily.
It is difficult to prove that an animal truly loves a person of its own free will. Even my little chick, Robin Hood, had no real choice but to develop feelings for me. How about looking at the other side? Every owner of a pet, be it a cat or a dog or some other animal, knows that people are capable of loving animals. But what about the quality of this love? Some might argue that people simply project their emotions onto animals and see them reflected back. Their pets are substitutes for children they wished they’d had, partners they’ve lost or friends who keep their distance. The subject is a minefield that I’d much rather avoid; however, as we’re talking about animal emotions, we should ask how our sentimental attachments affect our four-legged friends.