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Animal behavior usually has a weird combination of inborn instinct and learned behavior.

The one I've read about that stuck with me was dam building by beavers. Some part of the behavior is driven by a dislike of the sound of running water. Someone did an experiment with speakers playing the sound of running water and the beavers near the speakers would attempt to cover them with sticks and mud.

In my head I'm imaging that sound is like nails on a chalkboard to beaver.

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snowwrestler 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Instinct shows up locally as emotion. An individual animal acts based on their emotional state, and their emotional state is governed by a set of rules deep in their brain of which they are not conscious, many of which are set by birth.

This is true of humans as well. We each make food selections based on what tastes good. We seek particular sexual partners because it feels good. We protect and raise kids because it makes us feel good to do so.

This causes all sorts of evolutionarily weird side effects like people treating pets like kids in order to access the same emotional state as parenting. Or beavers covering speakers with mud and sticks.

	▲	mathgradthrow 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		evolution uses whatever hook it can find to tune behavior. Brains of sufficient complexity have to learn, you can't fit even enough information in DNA to manually wire up a brain, and its hard enough to guess how a barin will end up being wired. you can attach a squirrels optic nerve to their auditory cortex and they'll learn to see. (I may have the animal wrong). You can grow a brain completely inside out that will function. Instincts are deterministic, but learned behaviors.

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athenot 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

"Dislike" may be an anthropomorphism. Perhaps it's more of an opportunity for the beavers, since dams are their habitat and provide a food source for them.

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EasyMark 4 days ago | parent [-]

yep it could be just as likely that they enjoy building the dam whenever they hear water. seems much less stressful on the system

	▲	ASalazarMX 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		Evolution doesn't mind how it feels, it only matters if it's effective at adaptation. It could be that running water in their homes stresses them as much as it stresses us, albeit for different reasons. The running water speaker experiment was done in dry land, and beavers are very wary of going out of the water because of their predators, yet they risked working over the speakers.

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grouseway 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Maybe that's a thing, but here's a video of a pet beaver making a "dam" out of stuffies and other household objects.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ImdlZtOU80

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ics 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I like the sound of running water from a fountain. But if I hear it inside, I assume there’s a leak and I go looking for it to fix. Maybe the beavers just need to visit the zen garden.

	▲	finnh 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		Not a beaver, but close: an otter wreaked repeat havoc in the Sun Yat-sen botanical garden in Vancouver, eating many valuable koi: https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/the-godf-otter-part...

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washadjeffmad 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The impact of human presence on those behaviors can't be overstated, either.

There's been a disturbing trend with the return of the salmon for people to dress them up in little outfits and take selfies with them because they're so exhausted and easy to catch; it's like shooting fish in apparel.

	▲	wiether 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		I'm not sure if I want to ask for proof, to know you're not joking; or if I don't want to learn that this madness is actually real...

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neom 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Probably the best use of 45 minutes on youtube, I've watched it 4 times now and still love it every time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDbIAy9sMHk (doc on beavers)