Wild meerkats school their young
University of Cambridge scientists have discovered that older meerkats teach pups how to obtain food by incrementally introducing dead, injured and then live prey. Although learning per se wouldn't be surprising, whether wild mammals teach their young was still debated. The findings were published in this week's edition of the journal Science. Meerkats live in groups of three to 40 indi...Dominant meerkats render rivals infertile
When pregnant, dominant female meerkats subject their subordinates to escalating aggression and temporary eviction causing them to become overly stressed and as a result infertile, a new study finds. The new research reports that during the latter half of her pregnancy, the dominant female in a meerkat group commonly drives her subordinate females from the group for an average of three we...