Prairie dogs are cute, furry and are vicious serial killers with a thirst for blood, according to a new study. These animals are highly social, intelligent creatures who only consume plants for their dietary intake.
Ground squirrels are apparently killed by the creatures in an effort to reduce competition for food, researchers deduced. Both species of animals consume a similar diet, including prickly pears and specific grasses. Similar behavior, first noted in prairie dogs in Colorado during 2007, has never before been seen taking place among herbivores.
Five additional years of study by researchers revealed the behavior was most common in May, as young squirrels first venture out of their nests on the search for food. Biologists examined survival rates of youngsters born to parents of squirrel-killing, and compared that data to prairie dogs born to parents who did not murder their neighboring rodents.
The study found that reducing populations of ground squirrels led to greater survival rates for young prairie dogs. The behavior was also the driving factor driving fitness in the creatures, far outpacing any other characteristic driving health.
"Although carnivores are known to kill competing species, who would have thought that herbivores do so as well? In the case of carnivores, one possibility is that the species are eliminating potential predators on their young, but that doesn't seem likely in this case," Jonathan Losos of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University told Discovery News.
One possibility for the unusual behavior may be that groundhogs living in areas of dense grasslands are more likely to encounter ground squirrels, driving the murderous behavior. As humans introduce foreign species to areas outside their natural habitats, such activities may become more common, researchers speculate.
During the study, researchers recorded 47 prairie dogs that killed ground squirrels, with 36 of the animals being females. The deadliest specimen seen was "Killer Supreme," who was recorded killing nine squirrels over the course of four years.
They may be cute, but prairie dogs can be cold-blooded killers.
Research into how prairie dogs murder ground squirrels to reduce competition for food was profiled in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
Photo: Jan Fidler | Flickr
