Now I lay me down to howl

By T.W. Burger

The news seems suddenly full of animals.

No, not that guy in what we used to call Yugoslavia. I mean the ones naturewriter Henry Beston called "separate nations," the critters over which the Old Testament tries to convince us we have dominion.

We have a nasty habit of thinking ourselves superior and totally different than animals. I think it's because recognizing our kinship makes us nervous, shatters our idea of being made in God's image.

 Personally, I think we'd be a lot better off if we forgot that thing about being created as lesser versions of The Deity. I think it makes us snooty.

It's funny how things get caught up in the news. News stories seem to come in bunches. Some might call it a conspiracy, but I doubt it. I've worked in several newsrooms, and I can tell you that planning ahead and communicating is not something that generally gets done there.

In any case, I just read about a captive Indian elephant who starved herself to death after her only elephant friend died.

In another paper I read that coyotes are thriving in Pennsylvania. This doesn't seem like such a big deal, unless you stop to consider that coyotes didn't exist at all in the state before 1920. Game gurus estimate there are now 20,000 of these critters, which are actually a hybrid of the coyote and the timber wolf.

I remember during a camping trip a few years ago, when a chorus of coyotes filled the night. The walls of the tent seemed thin as tissue, and the night longer than absolutely necessary.

Some scientists think the coyotes have moved into Pennsylvania because we've altered the landscape from heavy forests to something approximating the more open spaces coyotes prefer. Other scientists think the crossbreeds are simply more opportunistic and less fearful of humans. I think they learned that Pennsylvania doesn't tax pensions, and have all come here to retire and get on school boards and annoy everybody.

One of those educational TV stations had a program the other night about how scientists are discovering that animals, particularly mammals, possess and indeed display emotions that are very much like our own. Shoot. Anybody who ever had a close relationship with a dog knows they can smile. And, for the record, even though pet dogs mostly adore their masters, they secretly think we're quite daft as a species, and feel a little bit sorry for us.

Now, dogs have been with us since way, way back when we lived in caves. Over thousands of generations it seems they have trained us to spend billions of dollars a year on doggie treats and fancy gourmet canned food, when the average canine can get by very well on road-kill. They have had the sense to keep most of their natural instincts intact.

Though the little Chihuahua in those Mexican fast-food ads would likely not survive long in the wilderness, it would probably survive longer than I would. Heck, I'd probably walk up to a grizzly and ask directions. Well, not really. I'm a guy. I never ask directions.

The TV show had some scientists with some hefty credentials making a good case for the ability of animals to think and feel. The most impressive was the fellow who has spent the past three decades studying a chimp named Washoe.

Being a chimp and therefore having no larynx, or "voice box," Washoe was taught a basic vocabulary in American Sign Language. ASL is used primarily for communication with the deaf. Interestingly, Washoe taught younger chimps at the research facility to use the language.

The program showed footage of Washoe naming objects, asking for things, and asking questions. Heck, I've seen locker room interviews that were less intelligible. And as far as I know Washoe isn't making a seven-figure annual salary.

But who am I to judge exactly what constitutes intelligence, anyway? One doesn't have to read too far beyond theses animal stories to find accounts of more savage lives, lives lived in Kosovo, in NATO war rooms, and in an increasing number of American classrooms. It is important to remember that it is rare for members of larger animal species to kill one another during disputes. In ours, however, it seems increasingly common for some individuals to go on killing sprees because they have low self-esteem, or because they think God told them to.

It will make me wonder, the next time I hear the coyotes raise their voices in eerie song, if they are really laughing at our arrogance, or giving thanks to their own gods that they have not "advanced" so far as we.

 T. W. Burger was raised in town and graduated from Athens High School in 1967, then worked as a driver of everything from fork trucks to garbage trucks and concrete mixers, has been an apprentice mortician and ambulance attendant.

Terry is now a semi-retired journalist who resides on the banks of Marsh Creek in Pennsylvania, just outside of Gettysburg.