Superprecocial

The term superprecocial refers to a level of physical maturity and capability in young animals that is most extreme. Examples are the Megapode birds, which have full flight feathers and which, in some species, can fly on the same day they hatch from their eggs.[1] Another example is the Blue Wildebeest, whose calves can stand within an average of six minutes from birth and walk within thirty minutes;[2][3] they can outrun a hyena within a day.[4][5][6] Such behavior gives them an advantage over other herbivore species. For instance, they are 100 times more abundant in the Serengeti ecosystem, than hartebeests, their closest taxonomic relative. Hartebeest calves are not as precocial as wildebeest calves and take up to thirty minutes or more before they stand, and as long as forty-five minutes before they can follow their mothers for short distances. They are unable to keep up with their mothers until they are more than a week old.[6]

The opposite pattern of growth and development is called altricial, and is typified by birds that hatch blind, uncoordinated, featherless, and tiny. Humans are also an altricial species, where their babies need years of care before they are able to survive on their own.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Starck, J.M.; Ricklefs, R.E. Avian Growth and Development. Evolution within the altricial precocial spectrum. Oxford University Press, New York, 1998.
  2. ↑ Estes, R., and E. O. Wilson. The behavior guide to African mammals: Including hoofed mammals, carnivores, primates. Los Angeles: University of California Press,1992.
  3. ↑ Sinclair, A. R. E., Simon A. R. Mduma, and Peter Arcese. What determines phenology and synchrony of ungulate breeding in Serengeti? Ecology 81 (8):2100-211, 2000.
  4. ↑ Kruuk, H. The spotted hyena: A study of predation and social behavior. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1972.
  5. ↑ Estes, R. D., and R. K. Estes. The birth and survival of wildebeest calves. Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie 50 (1):45, 1979.
  6. 1 2 Hopcraft, J. G. C.; Sinclair, A.; Holdo, R. M.; Mwangomo, E.; Mduma, S.; Thirgood, S.; Borner, M.; Fryxell, J. M. & Olff, H. Why are wildebeest the most abundant herbivore in the Serengeti ecosystem?. Serengeti IV: Sustaining Biodiversity in a Coupled Human--Natural System, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2013.
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