While wandering around London Zoo the other day, I got to see many exotic animals both known and unknown, such as the Sumatran Tiger and the Potoroo, which are now endangered and which are are at least partly (and quite rightly) being kept from extinction by their presence in their zoo.
It’s funny though: as beautiful as these endangered animals are, it was the scruffy pigeons which bothered me as I ate a hotdog who have been the more successful in adapting to human influence, thriving as feral animals where other species have been inadvertently killed off. Natural selection doesn’t care what looks good or impressive: all that matters is what survives. And the pigeon, despite their less than grand appearance, are very good at doing that.
Moscow’s stray dogs are changing their behaviour and tactics as the city changes and grows economically:
Back in the lean Soviet era, restaurants and the now-ubiquitous fast-food kiosks were scarce, so dogs were less likely to beg and more likely to forage through garbage, the zoologists say. Foraging dogs prospered best in the vast industrial zones of Moscow, where they lived a semiferal existence. Because they mainly relied on people to throw out food, and less on handouts, they kept their distance from humans.
Now, old factories are being transformed into shopping centers and apartment blocks, so strays have become more avid and skillful beggars. They have developed innovative strategies, zoologists say, such as a come-from-behind ambush technique: A big dog pads up silently behind a man eating on the street and barks. The startled man drops his food. The dog eats it.
There is also video footage of a dog waiting to for a subway train to arrive and open its doors. Even I struggle with that procedure when I go to a city with an underground system.
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