What are some really cool ways animals defend themselves?
Answer by Rory Young:
The honey badger uses raw courage to defend himself.
Whilst other animals use all sorts of weapons and tricks, the honey badger just uses his attitude. Here is one example of their fearlessness; the naturalist Jonathan Kingdon recorded three honey badgers taking a kill away from three sub-adult and four half-grown Lions. Here is a video that shows six lions attacking a honey badger. What does the honey badger do? He turns around and attacks them! And then he escapes! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iksnk1YVkac It is no wonder they have been called the world's toughest animal. Here is another example; they are known to attack animals of any size to protect themselves and amazingly there are records from the Kruger Park in South Africa of them killing adult male Cape buffaloes! So how does an animal that weighs just fifteen kilograms kill a fearsome buffalo weighing nine hundred kilograms, with inch-thick skin and overlapping ribs for armor?
The answer I'm afraid will make any man cringe and live in fear of honey badgers forever after. They go for the groin... and then the animal bleeds to death... That's right. No queensbury rules or any other rules with these little buggers. They are the street fighters of the bush. Of course such an animal couldn't be content to eat anything mundane either. One of their favorite snacks is cobra no less.
They don't have any special technique for catching venomous snakes and often get bitten. However they are resistant to the venom! One thing that always makes me chuckle when I watch a honey badger wander past is the swagger. They really do swagger when they walk and they bloody well deserve to!
What are some really cool ways animals defend themselves?
