The Red Deer in Autumn Rutting Season
When autumn colours set in, and the chill starts to build, it is also the time when some animals feel they are 'in heat'. For the deer, it is when they are in autumn 'rut', their breeding season. After an unusually warm start of October, I've been waiting for almost a month, to go and watch them at the ancient hunting ground- The Royals used it since the 12th century, but now reduced to around 10 sq.km of National Nature Reserve between Richmond and Wimbledon. But then also had to wait for a decent sunny weekend to capture their mood.
That means getting really lucky in this part of the world. Finally this Sunday, sun smiled; towards the fag end of the season when stags are most interesting to watch, as they are the most 'interested' too! ;).
But when I reached there early afternoon, trekked half an hour and spotted a herd of around 50 red deer lazing around, chewing the cud, there was nothing to suggest other than just another day in the Deer Calendar ;)
There was no sense of planning for the year ahead, the next generation ;). Two possibilities came to my mind- One, that they are done with the rutting season. Two, they might be very resigned to the fact that
with 7billion of those pesky 2-footed creatures taking over the entire planet, there wasn't much they can do to give it a try and compete!. They couldn't even feel proud that there were at least 1.4 million cattle or 1.1million sheep (or even 18 million chicken, if they want to surpass humans by numbers) —That could join for an “Occupy Streets” protests against unfair treatment meted out by humans, and their downright ugly industrial Animal Farming.
They couldn’t feel proud, because these sheer numbers, they know, are all down to the need or greed of that crazily brainy breed, who has the chutzpah- like a country calling itself ‘Great’- to call themselves wise, Homo ‘Sapiens’..
"Ha, Sapient!, my hoof. Who cares a hoot"- one deer seemed to mull as it chewed the cud.
I kept watching the animated thoughts of the deer folk, while I waited to find out the real truth about their state of mind- whether ‘in rut’ or not; the season over or not.
The lighter side of thoughts, of heavy-thinking deer think tank apart,
I wondered whether, like many mammals, there ever was a time in human history when humans had a breeding season!! ;) - when women would have ovulated/menstruated once, or couple of times and hormones spiked only during such season(s). Sounds funny to think about it, but to have a season to think about dating and mating, and to have no such matters in mind outside it would be unthinkable for many of us humanfolk! ;)
Would the world be happier, grumpier or more solemn in such a scenario ?
Finally, after 2 hours of waiting,when starting to feel rather unlucky,
I was getting distracted and attracted more to a flock of very raucous parakeets that I had been hearing in the background much of the time. Followed their noisy chatter for a few minutes.
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Ring-necked Parakeet. Most of the Parakeets in the wild in Britain originated in India, were kept as pets and later a wild population grew from the escaped &released birds, with latest estimate around 6000 birds- mostly in the South-East (Even though Greater London and surrounding areas is still its stronghold, the species has been recorded in almost every county in England, and has reached Wales and the Scottish borders. Interestingly, though frugivorous and vegetarian in its natural habitat in South Asia, in Britain they are omnivorous- at times eating even meat! ) http://www.rspb.org.uk/ |
Slowly I became aware of the changing dynamics of the herd, the tension in the air, the nervous females, the intimidated and side-lined stags, the bullying alpha-male.
Clearly, in that herd there was no challenger who could take on the alpha-male with the most formidable sized antlers that others fad in comparison. So there was not so much of a fight- of the horny males locking horns! ;)
There was more of chasing off other stags and harassing to keep the harem to itself .
Then chasing behind females going in rounds, giving up dodging female after a round of chase..
Sometimes bellowing at the end of it. It was for the first time that I was watching this 'rut' happening live.
When going behind the hinds, the alpha male was often sticking its tongue out as if sensing something in the air,
may be for secretions to see if the female was 'ready', and for some, it would try to touch the tongue as if 'marking' the checked-out females!
While being shutter-happy in the midst, could sense a bit tense ambience at times, especially when the stags were chased off - with rather distinguished expansive antlers, that Alpha-male seemed to hold a harem and keep away some 15+ adult stags from the herd of around 50 ;)
Though after couple of hours of hanging around the herd without intruding their space, they seemed to
take less notice of me than earlier, I remained alert of movements around me. Especially of the Alpha-male.
There was a moment I was stumped, as to which way to go, when a
tall stag with long sleek antlers appreared to come straight at me when being chased off by the
alpha male-
That's when the warning signs I read elsewhere really struck home: "During the rutting season, it can be dangerous to approach deer".
That's when the warning signs I read elsewhere really struck home: "During the rutting season, it can be dangerous to approach deer".
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As an interesting coincidence, 3 days before this deer-outing, attended an event @London School of Economics [ @LSE's Department of Management, a BBC Radio 4 public conversation ], where economist Robert Frank, talked about his new book The Darwin Economy: Liberty, Competition, and the Common Good (He is Cornell University professor of economics and management, Author of 'The Economic Naturalist', and a text book 'Principles of Economics' co-authored with Fed Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke. The other books include Winner-Take-All Society, Luxury Fever, What Price the Moral High Ground?. He is also New York Times economics columnist. His books have been translated into 22 languages). It was a BBC Radio4 interview & public conversation hosted by LSE Dept of Management, conducted by BBC economics editor Paul Mason.. There was an audience of around 800 @LSE. In the opening stages of the conversation, Paul Mason asked an interesting question: "It is rare to read an economics book and come away with such a startling image, as one comes away with from the beginning of your book, of an elk (the large deer, called moose in the US) with giant antlers. Explain to us, what you mean by that metaphor/analogy", and Frank goes on to talk about antlers in elk : About balancing evolutionary advantage and disadvantage of having bigger and bigger antlers as the species evolved. The advantage of bigger antlers, is the reproductive advantage of getting to mate with as many females as it can get, by fighting off those with smaller antlers; disadvantage of it being the bigger risk of getting easily hunted down by wolves. The antlers grew bigger and reached an equilibrium [This equilibrium may not be good for 'the elk males as a group': Having to carry antlers weighing upto 40pounds]. The point being, individual gains/interests does not coincide with group interest in this case.
I've added more about this event at this other blog post-
It has some excerpted text of the talk, edited audio podcast to fit into 30min slot of BBC Radio4, and the full 1 hr video from LSE. It also has links to videos of his talks at other places, including that uploaded by Princeton University Press, in which he reveals what propelled him to write this book: Fed-up and frustrated by hearing all the rhetoric of the libertarian American right wing, he sat and started typing his response, whic over a period of time evolved into this book! Here is sneak peak- a 7min video highlight, of Rober Frank talking about the themes in the book at some other place.
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Labels: Natural History, Nature, Red Deer