why-animals-do-the-thing:blueandbluer:chainsxwsmile:Lemon sharks may occasionally get possessive of
why-animals-do-the-thing:blueandbluer:chainsxwsmile:Lemon sharks may occasionally get possessive of divers giving attention to other sharks, and try to chase off any tiger sharks of whom the lemons might be jealous. @why-animals-do-the-thing … this seems anthropomorphic to me. I would think it’d be more likely that they are just being territorial, more than jealous. Thoughts?I absolutely think it’s anthropomorphic. The guy who they’re quoting, Eli Martinez, is all over shark media telling people they “like” interactions with humans and generally promoting the idea that cartilaginous fish are going to have the same sort of internal state and interest in humans that mammals are capable of. I looked up Eli Martinez and I can’t find any academic background in anything regarding behavioral science - he’s been running shark dives for a decade and stared a shark diver magazine, but at a quick glance all of it is the same level of anthropomorphic. All of his dives appear to involve baiting the sharks and letting people touch the sharks, which is I guess a way to get people to not hate them but not a great way to actually teach people about natural behavior or to communicate that not every big predator is here for us to snuggle (or will want to snuggle us). As to the actual behavior, Eli states that oh, well yes we’re totally chumming and baiting these sharks but ‘y’know aside from that they’re still totally asking for nose rubs’ yet in the next breath says there’s no way to differentiate between the shark being possessive of the bait box vs being possessive of the diver’s attention. He’s saying that there are times when he’ll be trying to put his hands on a tiger shark and a lemon shark will push it out of the way - but in the footage shown, he’s sitting almost directly next to the bait box and therefore proximity to him where he’s able to reach out an touch them is also that crucial proximity to the food. I think this is just a dude who makes a living anthropomorphizing shark behavior to tourists misrepresenting shark behavior in a way that humans really key into - we want to feel special, we want to feel like these giant prehistoric predators for some reason values us. It’s much more likely they’re just guarding the food and he happens to be trying to touch them at the same time. -- source link