Animals respond to fearful situations

[Catherine]

Animals respond to fearful situations the same way we do. They know when it is more dangerous and they act accordingly.
It is not unlike how we react after watching a scary movie. They stay in groups or avoid areas where a predator is more likely to be waitng. 
They respond differently during a full moon. 

https://www.salon.com/2017/11/20/animals...s_partner/

I can understand how they learn to react to frightening situations. I think much of our fear response is learned.
It is sad when the fear is so great that birds feed their young less. It makes them vulnerable and less able to survive. 
Living in a fearful situation is very bad for all of us, animals and people.  This needs more study and more thought.  Does the actual fear cause a bird to feed its young less or does the bird feel less safe to look for food and has less to give its young.

This does need more thought.

[Tobi]

I think that any creature who is in a fear mode of behaviour is not able to act as it would if it were relaxed and secure. We can see that in ourselves. How many times when bad news has come one way or another, we may lose our appetite temporarily because, I guess, there are stress hormones in the system? And how many times when we are scared it's hard to concentrate on anything else, or succeed at an unrelated task?

It's good to have some level of fear response. That's natural and a necessity for survival. But when the fear over-rides everything else in a chronic sense, is when it works against survival.

I just do hope that if studies are made, they are made compassionately and intelligently, and aren't going to deliberately subject animals to manufactured stress situations in order to study their responses!

[Catherine]

Quote:I just do hope that if studies are made, they are made compassionately and intelligently, and aren't going to deliberately subject animals to manufactured stress situations in order to study their responses!

I worried about that. It isn't clear how they got their data. 

Animal that are trying to raise young in stressful, fearful situations have less success because the fear stops them from feeding the babies. If this is how creatures respond to stress and fear then this is bad news for species survival. The more endangered a species is the more we need them to succeed as parents.  If they are that endangered there is probably a reason. There are probably environmental stresses and habitat loss. This would reduce the chances of babies surviving.

I would think that having unhealthy babies would make the parents even more upset. At a certain point the cycle of fear feeds itself. We could lose species because we have made them too frightened to survive.

[Tobi]

People need to find out what the stressors are and either eliminate them or if they can't be entirely eliminated, then moderate them.
We know, for example that too much artificial light stresses birds and makes them behave differently which is not healthy for them. We have tower buildings all lit up (which is not good for anything, people, the enviroment, or wildlife) Even most homes are over-lit! Security lights with motion sensors come blaring on and don't go off for ten minutes or so, and most of the time they are a waste of time! They respond to a passing cat out at night, or a Badger! What a waste of electricity and what a shock for all the roosting wild birds!
Security lights ought to only come on when doors, gates or windows are touched.

[Catherine]

I agree about the motion sensor lights. They flash on if the wind blows leaves past the sensor. Worse are car alarms. A squirrel can set them off and sometimes they just keep on blaring until the owner shows up. If the person is away or it is the middle of the night the sound can go on a long time.

I think light pollution is one of the biggest stressors on wild species in urban settings. The lights are hard on us too. We have no sense of day  or night. All our biological rythms are mixed up. It is more noticeable in birds because they are more fragile and have shorter lives. Bigger animals, humans included will eventually be effected by light pollution.

Normal stresses probably serve to keep a species alert. The abnormal stresses keep them on the alert too much and that would wear the body down. It is good to fear dangerous things, but when fear is constantly triggered it can be deadly.
There are a lot of humans who are suffering from anxiety just like the birds.

I think we are in a situation where helping the birds by reducing stressors will probably help us too.

[Tobi]

Human beings already are affected by light pollution. In many people, the serotonin/melatonin balance is out of gear. This can cause all sorts of disease and damages well being to some extent, and nearly always affects sleep patterns which can take its toll on the immune system.
Some of it is self-induced.....such as being on the computer in the middle of the night! lol ....like you know who? (me).....but in certain people, doesn't appear to make much difference. In others it is something they can't ever get away from. If they live in built up areas there is never any real darkness.

[Catherine]

Look at the time of day when I usually post.

We make sure we get some rest later though. Some people and animals are exposed to light all the time.
For people another problem is the lack of daytime sunshine. We lack normal dark and we lack normal light.
Birds living in the city have the same problem. Tall buildings keep them from getting proper light and the constant light keeps them from proper dark.

I think the irregular light situation must cause fear/stress responses. 
We need to do a  lot more study before we can be sure what is happening. One thing for sure is that the effects on us all are not good.