Lead
At the Shennonglin Wild Ape Research Center in Japan, a researcher spotted a macaque riding on the back of a sika deer by observing a surveillance camera, which aroused great interest among researchers because no such behavior had been detected before.
The researchers continued to look at the video and found that the macaque tried to mate on the back of the sika deer after staying on the back of the sika deer for a while, and although the monkey had something to gain on the back of the sika deer, the appearance of this behavior opened up new areas of research for the researchers.
1. The back of a sika deer on a macaque.
In 2017, a researcher at the Shennong Forest Wild Ape Research Center in Japan observed one of the macaques when he found that a macaque was riding on the back of a sika deer and stayed on the back of the sika deer without coming down.
Located in Shennonglin in Akita Prefecture in the Tohoku region, the Japan Shennonglin Wild Ape Research Center covers an area of about 23,000 hectares, which is the last haven for the natural habitat of Japanese macaques and the last chessboard for Japanese macaque activities.
There are more than 1,300 macaques in this land, which occupy the core position of the entire Shennonglin ecosystem, and there are also more than 10,000 sika deer living on this land, and the interaction between the two species can be said to be very interesting.
At the Shinnonbayashi Wild Macaque Research Center in Japan, researchers set up cameras to record the lives of macaques, which also helped the researchers in their research work.
Back in 2017, the researcher immediately told researchers at the Japan Macaque Research Center about the situation when he spotted a macaque monkey riding on the back of a sika deer through a surveillance camera.
The researchers immediately investigated the location where the macaque was found, and after some searching, they finally found the sika deer, and the sika deer happened to have a hole in the worn skin on its back, just in time to see the face of a macaque, and this macaque was riding on the back of a sika deer.
After seeing this scene, the researchers couldn't believe their eyes, but the facts were in front of their eyes, and it was impossible to say that they were dazzled, so the researchers decided to investigate the macaque.
After investigating the identity of the macaque, the researchers found that the original macaque was called "Blue P-216", that is, a male macaque, and the status of this macaque in the monkey group is not high, but it is not low.
After some investigation, the researchers decided to set up a camera on the sika deer's "mount" to allow for a more detailed observation of the macaque's behavior.
After a period of observation, the researchers found that it was not the first time that the male macaque had ridden the sika deer's "mount", but had already ridden it several times.
In addition to this macaque, the researchers also found that two other macaques also regularly ride the sika deer's "mount", and these two macaques are "blue P-220" and "blue P-221".
And these three macaques stayed on the "mount" of the sika deer for a short time, basically about 20 minutes on average.
It is worth mentioning that all three macaques are adults, but none of them are in heat, so the researchers speculate that the purpose of the macaques riding on the "mount" of the sika deer is not to come into heat.
2. The reason for riding a macaque on the back of a sika deer.
After researchers studied the behavior of the macaque on the back of a sika deer, they finally came to the conclusion that the macaque was there to observe the group and the environment.
When macaques observe the surrounding environment, they will choose a relatively high place, and the back of the sika deer is a better perspective, so the macaque will choose to take the back of the sika deer to observe the surrounding environment.
The appearance of macaques riding on the back of a sika deer is not really significant, but it raises a series of questions for researchers as to why macaques choose to ride on the back of a sika deer.
Sika deer is only a minor role in macaque society, and there is not much intersection between macaques and sika deer, so why do macaques choose to ride on the back of sika deer?
After studying this question, the researchers concluded that the behavior of macaques riding on the backs of sika deer was related to competition in the macaque group.
In the macaque group, the higher status macaques are generally male macaques, while the lower status macaques are generally female macaques, and there are some less status macaques in the macaque group.
These low-status macaques are either young monkeys that have just reached adulthood or are less popular with macaque groups, which are very difficult to survive in the macaque group.
Therefore, the researchers believe that these low-status macaques will choose to maintain a cooperative relationship with the sika deer so that they can protect themselves well.
Sika deer have a good body structure, which can not only help macaques observe their surroundings, but also protect them well, so macaques with lower status will choose to maintain a cooperative relationship with sika deer.
And this male macaque has another purpose on the "mount" of riding a sika deer, that is, to mate.
Although this male macaque does not have a high status in the macaque group, he is cheerful, brave, and has a good relationship with the female macaques, so this male macaque has a very good status in the macaque group.
When mating with female macaques, this male macaque also has some trouble, because there are some macaques in the macaque group that prefer to mix, and under the interference of these macaques, it is difficult for this male macaque to mate with female macaques.
Therefore, the male macaque had to find some way to avoid the interference of these macaques, and riding on the back of a sika deer became the best choice for this male macaque.
3. The reason why macaques attack humans.
Macaques are very active in human society, and the appearance of intimate relationships with sika deer is also very rare, so this has also aroused the interest of researchers.
The researchers concluded that the intimate relationship between the macaque and the sika deer stemmed from competition within the macaque group.
In the macaque group, the competition between the male macaques is very fierce, because the higher status macaques are able to attract the attention of the female macaques, that is, the higher status macaques are able to reproduce offspring, which is actually a protection mechanism for the monkey group.
The lower status macaques do not have so many opportunities, so the survival pressure of the lower status macaques in the monkey group is also very high, so the lower status macaques will choose to maintain a cooperative relationship with the sika deer.
The emergence of an intimate relationship between macaques and sika deer has also opened up a new avenue for researchers to study cross-species "love" behavior.
In the past, the intimacy between macaques and sika deer was thought to be accidental, but now the relationship between macaques and sika deer is very complicated, and the reason why macaques choose to maintain a cooperative relationship with sika deer is to protect themselves.
However, with the continuous expansion of human activities, after the relationship between macaques and sika deer was discovered, people also began to study the relationship between macaques and sika deer.
In 2018, researchers conducted a study of the relationship between macaques and sika deer and found that there is still a lot that has not been discovered in the relationship between macaques and sika deer.
epilogue
The impact of human activities on wildlife behaviour is complex, so the emergence of an intimate relationship between macaques and sika deer raises the question of why do macaques attack humans?
In the past, there was not much conflict between macaques and humans, but as human activities continued to expand, the habitat of macaques was also threatened, so macaques attacked humans, so people began to hunt Japanese macaques in order to protect humans.
In response to such behavior, human beings should reflect on whether they should allow wild animals to have more freedom, respect the living environment of wild animals, and strive for harmonious coexistence between humans and the natural world.