What in a creature's evolutionary past could lead it to believe that a Cheeto is safe to eat? I thought it might be they just eat anything that doesn't smell rotten but they pass on eating all kinds of non-rotten leaves, sticks, etc all the time. Is this less mysterious than I suppose?
2006-08-09 07:00:39 · 7 answers · asked by ideogenetic 7 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Biology
Just so people won't freak out- I'm NOT feeding my pets chocolate or Cheetos. I dropped a piece of sharp cheddar cheese on the deck the other day when eating outside. I picked it up and tossed it into the bushes where our resident skunk resides. I checked the next day and it was gone!
I've not seen any mice in the yard; only skunks, chipmunks, cats & squirrels.
2006-08-09 09:32:01 · update #1
I am overly-generalizing/giving my opinion when I say the following:
"simple" creatures (insects etc) have sensory limbs that specifically target a certain chemical make up. For example, female mosquitos lock in on blood "scent" when they are prodding around the surface of our skin. The scent of blood/nector are probably the only thing they smell so thats what they figure is food.
for "advanced" creatures, it takes the teaching of the parents to tell them what is right to eat, making it a learned behavior instead of an innate behavior. For others, its a trial an error thing where they get sick and learn to stay away from that food. Given enough time and selection, evolution would probably dictate that when a dog smells chocolate, they would not eat it. However, no selection is occuring right now because humans know better than to give dogs chocolate and therefore there is no bias for dogs that know not to eat chocolate.
2006-08-09 10:10:55 · answer #1 · answered by leikevy 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
They don't. Most human food has an appealing smell, and dogs like many other animals, are curious creatures that tend to lick just about anything, and if it tastes good they'll eat it.
2006-08-09 07:34:24 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
I think that for a lot of pets, we become like foster parents and therefore teach our pets what is safe. It is usually not a good idea to feed human food to pets but I am sure they learn from us and want to share our food as they would their parents.
2006-08-09 07:49:26 · answer #3 · answered by JimZ 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
by smelling and trial and error,,
you can put human food to rats, they will eat it, but you might also add poison to this food, in this case rats still eat it but in case one rat died the others will recognize this situation and keep away from that food
2006-08-09 07:30:01 · answer #4 · answered by Animal breeder 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I dunno...my dog at the rug in front of our door once. We had blue and red string in the backyard for a week.
I think it all has to do with what smells good and what doesnt.
2006-08-09 07:07:39 · answer #5 · answered by Franklin 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
They don't.
Chocolate wreaks havoc on dogs. But they'll eat it up.
2006-08-09 07:04:07 · answer #6 · answered by ymingy@sbcglobal.net 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
they dont its your responsibility to feed your pet and know what they should or should not eat
2006-08-09 08:02:53 · answer #7 · answered by geigerjanelle 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋