We can get an idea of how happy an animal is by observing what they do.
Ferrets chirp when they are having a good time, horses will point their ears towards you and have a relaxed mouth, and parrots sing, whistle, or make a grinding, purring sound with their beak.
Play is one of the more reliable and universal ways to tell if a creature is content. Playful animals will jump into the air, pounce, kick their feet up while they run, and generally be more energetic than they need to be.
But for a more visual explanation, there's the Instagram account The Snuggle Is Real. It shares wholesome photos of both wild and domestic animals living the good life and has made quite a few new posts since our last publication on it, so we thought we can't let you fall behind on its content.
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According to Melissa Starling, a Postdoctoral researcher at the University of Sydney, who holds a BSc (Hons) in zoology and a Ph.D. in dog behavior, personality, emotions and cognition, we can often get a good idea if animals are happy or unhappy by looking at how they are behaving in general.
"A cat that purrs because it's happy may also be winding her body around your legs, or relaxed in your lap, have her tail high in the air, or roll over on her back," Starling said. "All this shows she is trusting and interested."
"Likewise, a rabbit grinding its teeth while relaxing will also likely be stretching its body out as well. You can tell how relaxed a rabbit is by how stretched out it is while resting. If a rabbit is in pain, it tends to hunch up and squeeze its eyes half shut like it is wincing. Animals that are relaxed and not tense are usually happy and content."
I'm nominating this as the new term for a group of meercats: a meercult! Genius, Matheus, sheer genius. :)
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"Listen guys guys, listen...tomorrow is Greg's birthday and we haven't gotten him a present, any ideas? Is he looking? Act natural"
It seems appropriate that a group of meerkats is called a gang or a mob
How bizarre, for a second I thought this was one of those "rotting meat" flowers about to bloom
This is a heat lamp (from what I know) and if they are all under it to keep warm, I find that quite sad :(
Worked at a zoo a few years ago. They did the same thing when it was good weather also. Think its like with a cat lying in the sunlight, it doesn’t necessarily mean they are cold
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'Alright, guys we have a big night tonight. It's gonna be full of hijinks, tomfoolery and shenanigans. But first, let us pray'
I was searching for something "strange things" related.
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Meerkat fact: their tummies have thinner fur and they go out of their burrows after a cold night and lie on their backs to quickly absorb heat. Those little tummies in this pic... too cute
Captured by a long range lens, these are no meer cats, but a clandestine mob plotting their latest espionage.
Ed was bringing the sunglasses but he’s still sat on the john after that scorpion he ate
“Ok, Dave, John, and Justin go left, and then we plant the tracker, and get the heck out”
Kinda sad actually. Meerkats live in very hot desert regions and these poor little guys are in a zoo somewhere cold.
literally thought this was like a plant at first that opens up... or a demogorgon lol
OK, so every night, we'll meet up under this heat lamp and plan our escape.
These are amazing animals I watched a few episodes of meerkat manor and one them was dieing from old age and all of rest lined up.walked past him/her to show respect/love for the one dieing I think that's kind of cool
Is it just me or does it look like they are all peeing into a lava pit while making conversation? Or something worse?
Starling said we can also see what animals like to do by what they choose to come back to over and over again.
"If your animal chooses to lie in the sun or look for tasty treats or dig holes, then you know when they are doing that, they are probably happy," the researcher explained.
"So, to know when an animal is happy, we need to look at more than what one body part is doing, and we might need to watch them to get to know them."
Friendly reminder: downvotes are NOT dislike buttons. Downvoting a comment just because you don't agree = not cool. If a comment gets downvoted, its author will get banned from the site. So please downvote only in case of obvious spam ("how to make cash") or if someone is literally harrassing a fellow panda
The question of how do we know if our pets—especially the prehistoric ones—are content has been explored for centuries.
In 1872, Charles Darwin published a whole book on the subject, suggesting that humans and many animals express emotions in similar ways—if anything, emotions actually evolved before our species did.
But philosopher Thomas Nagel said that we’ll never know if this is true or not. In his paper 'What is it like to be a bat?' Nagel wrote that even if we spent our days “hanging upsidedown by one’s feet in an attic,” it’s impossible to know how a bat feels, and not even Batman has that kind of inner access.
I don't get why this is on the list? It's just a picture of a chess board...
But just because we aren't 100 percent sure how an animal feels, doesn’t mean they don’t feel something.
Dolphins, cows, chimpanzees, dogs, and even squirrels have similar emotional processing centers in the brain as humans, so at the very least, they would experience basic emotions like fear, anger, grief, and joy.
One group of scientists was so sure of this that they signed the Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness in 2012, acknowledging that all mammals and birds (and some invertebrates, like octopuses) are conscious creatures.
Plus, we've all witnessed heartfelt and heart-wrenching displays of animal emotions, like when Damini the elephant reportedly died of grief following the death of her pachyderm partner at the zoo.
Or when Christian the lion joyfully embraced the men who reared him after spending nine months apart.
I think this is my favourite. It doesn't look like this is their first time climbing that tree
Interestingly, scientists have shown rats exude just as much “happiness,” if not more, than other mammals.
In the ’90s, neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp made a surprising discovery: rats loved being tickled. Turns out, when rats play, they emit high-frequency chirps undetectable by the human ear. Using special equipment to isolate the sounds, Panksepp discovered when he tickled the rats, their feverish chirps were akin to giggling.
if those apples are fermented, there's gonna be one hell of a hangover..
Note: this post originally had 31 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
Friendly reminder: downvotes are NOT dislike buttons. Downvoting a comment just because you don't agree = not cool. If a comment gets downvoted, its author will get banned from the site. So please downvote only in case of obvious spam ("how to make cash") or if someone is literally harrassing a fellow panda
I disagree (although I didn't downvote you). I think that's exactly what the downvote button is for, to show you disagree with something. I usually don't continue to downvote if they're already at the 'this comment is hidden' stage though.
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31 actually, if you look at the bottom of a lof of these before you can vote on the article as a whole there is a little small grey spot that's say this was originally 31 but was cut down to 30. Sometimes the OG article can be hundreds of posts long.
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to be honest all these pictures are so cute these animals no cap
Friendly reminder: downvotes are NOT dislike buttons. Downvoting a comment just because you don't agree = not cool. If a comment gets downvoted, its author will get banned from the site. So please downvote only in case of obvious spam ("how to make cash") or if someone is literally harrassing a fellow panda
I disagree (although I didn't downvote you). I think that's exactly what the downvote button is for, to show you disagree with something. I usually don't continue to downvote if they're already at the 'this comment is hidden' stage though.
Load More Replies... 31 actually, if you look at the bottom of a lof of these before you can vote on the article as a whole there is a little small grey spot that's say this was originally 31 but was cut down to 30. Sometimes the OG article can be hundreds of posts long.
Load More Replies... to be honest all these pictures are so cute these animals no cap
