Apex predators

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I occasionally watch all kinds of videos on YouTube and I noticed a weird fascination with monsters; apex predators specifically. Whether it’s about polar bears or crocodiles, or extinct things such as T-Rex, the prevalent theme is that humans are defenceless against such monsters and yada yada.

Bitch, please. The Inuit used to hunt polar bears. Their fur was considered particularly good material for women’s footwear, because of the soft fur. They even prayed to a polar bear god to send polar bears their way to be killed.

Crocodiles? We make shoes out of them, too. All kinds of leather accessories as well. Nice texture.

I used to wonder about human babies; their tendency to cry loudly seemed like an extremely anti-survivalist strategy in leopard country. It would attract all the predators from miles away. And then it clicked – no, the leopards wouldn’t be attracted, because a crying baby means lots of adult humans with sharp sticks. Bad, very bad. Humans like leopard fur, it’s very soft.

There’s only one “apex predator” in the world today, and it awarded other, lesser predators a protected status, because we think they are cute and interesting to have around. If a Megalodon was found to still exist, it would not be an apex predator, but a protected, endangered species. If humans wanted to hunt it for shark fin soup or something, we could drive it to extinction by Tuesday.

If T-Rex happened to get resurrected, it would be instantly endangered from poachers who think its teeth are great for piano keys or something, and its testicles are an aphrodisiac. An African elephant isn’t that much smaller than a T-Rex, and it’s endangered, not from T-Rex or Allosaurus, but from dumbass poachers armed with AK-47s.

Think about that. T-Rex would be hunted to extinction by people who are interested in what steaks made of its meat taste like, and they’d like to have trinkets carved from its bones. Whales are huge and what not, and we entertain ourselves with stories about monster whales, and we almost drove them to extinction because their oil was considered extremely useful before petroleum industry was a thing.

Big things are just endangered species to us; no matter how big. We put them under protection and know each by name. It’s the small things that are a danger to us, paradoxically; mosquitos, ticks, viruses, bacteria, fungi.

The only big things that are stupid enough to hunt humans are those whose populations weren’t reduced to only those who ran in panic after hearing a human baby crying.

8 thoughts on “Apex predators”

  2. In today's leftist world, individual is perceived as weak and needs safe spaces and protection from government.
    And singe human in nature is indeed fairly weak … but that's not how we evolved. We evolved as a group. As a terrifying group.
    Most people don't experience that any more, comfort is too great, so great that they would feed and cuddle with wolves and bears – which are confused as fuck 🙂

    One of the rare occasions when people can still experience why every animal avoids us at all cost are driven group hunts.
    Sure, today group hunts are more tradition and parade since it's not survival thing and most hunters are not skilled – and it's still fucking terrifying.
    Now imagine every single hunter is highly skilled and knows his shit to the bones.

    30 or more hunters select area where scouts detected specific species presence – in today's world – wild boars.
    Now make no mistake – wild boar is one of the most if not the most dangerous animal in central Europe. They can get huge, like 200kg or more huge, they come with razor sharp tusks, can be incredibly fast, has extraordinary smell sense and even though it's not a predator – it attacks more often than any predator living in the same area. Sure, that statistic is skewed because wild boars are hunted significantly more often than any other species combined – where we come to their next strength – they are extraordinary survivalists and they are huge in numbers. It's practically impossible to push them into extinction – there is no animal that can even remotely compare. Dangerous to individuals and not only strong big males – even a 80kg boar (which it reaches in his second year of life) is dangerous and female with cubs can be very dangerous as well.

    So, wild boar attack is extremely dangerous. It happens very quickly, very violently – they attack with their tusks and are so strong they can throw a human into air with their head, ripping human flesh and breaking bones in the process.
    Even with a weapon, one on one encounters often end up with serious injuries. It takes calm and skilled shooter who can take down a charging boar at close distance before it reaches him.

    But in group hunt, things change. Three groups of hunters close three sides of an area and last group goes into that "ring". With a bunch of dogs. Dogs bread and trained for wild boar hunts.
    When such hunt starts and dogs find wild boars … something primal and ancient is awoken. Blood "boils" (probably adrenaline), focus intensifies, senses are sharpened – and one enters into predator mode it never knew it existed inside him. Thirst for blood rises.
    Doesn't happen to everyone, hunter genes are not passed to everyone it seems, probably from time when hunting stopped being crucial for survival – but when group of people to whom it does happen start the hunt – it's fucking terrifying. It's forrest fire terrifying. Every single animal species tries to get out of that ring – and they are not even hunted.
    I was in a hunt where pack of wolves got caught in the ring. A pack of wolves can take down any animal they want, they could take down several humans with ease – and yet – they go into ghost mode, trying to get out of the ring as quietly and as silently as possible, even though most dogs get scared shitless when they bump into wolf scent.
    And those guys that go into the ring with dogs … they are most skilled hunters with most experience borderline crazy and fearless – they go straight in, often crawling in bush tunnels made by boars – it's near insanity to someone in comfort of living room eating supermarket food.
    But once you see it, once you experience it, once you see group of boars running towards you and you turn into killing machine, not caring if you get hurt … T-Rex? Cmon … it's just large, tasty chicken 🙂

    Humans are really good at adapting and organising and are quite persistent. Hunting T-Rex could be a challenge, but only at beginning and I am certain we would quickly have effective strategies to hunt down T-Rex with ease.
    Sure, there would be individual casualties here and there, same as with wild boars, but to a species – those are irrelevant.

    Those people having apex predator fantasies should once experience driven group hunt to learn how apex predator really looks like. That's how we evolved and that's how we made every predator scared shitless.
    But in movies, you will get some scared individuals running for their lives or individuals stalked in night by a predator … which is interesting – today, we can hunt in the night because of technology, but there is no ease in it. One can feel deep in their bones they are NOT equipped for such hunt. No night vision, bad sense of smell, bad hearing – you are a sitting duck, even with tech.
    I had numerous encounters with foxes and badgers I NEVER saw coming with all my thermals and what not. I encountered jackals circling me and sniffing me out, checking what the hell am I.
    A cougar could take me down with ease, I would never see it coming unless I would luckily glance it with thermal.
    You can get good at it, especially hunting wild boars by knowing environment and animal behaviour, by leaving food or waiting in silence at water source … but you need at least a lamp. And thats when there is nothing in the woods that could hunt you 🙂

    But organised driven group hunt … now that's something else, that's how we dominated everything by becoming unstoppable force of nature.
    Sure, we are good at individually stalking at daytime, very good actually. Our awareness of the environment is very good, our eyes register movement with perfection, we can move silently, we can plan, adapt to wind, read tracks very well – but that's good for non-predator animals like roe deers and I could easily take down roe deer with bow and arrow – I don't even need a rifle which simply makes it easier, more convenient and quicker for the animal.
    But you don't want to hunt a bear like that. In fact, today it's not allowed to hunt a bear like that (in our area at least) because it's too dangerous. Because a wounded bear will shred you to pieces several times over before it dies. Even with rifle, let alone with ancient weapons.
    No, you want bear in flight not fight mode. You want to scare him, disorient him with dogs and then put several spears into him from different sides.
    We learned that, we adapted and we made hunting bears a routine even though a single bear can easily kill entire village of leftists hiding in safe spaces 🙂

    • Regarding boars, at one point there were so many tracks on Sljeme that I carried an axe and a hunting knife when going there to pick mushrooms or take pictures. 🙂 Not sure that would've helped much, but it made me feel better.

      • Youtube is flooded with AI videos, so I can' find what I was looking for.
        You can get some ideas about dynamics here:
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGFdPbyfkc0
        And these are mostly small boars, only number 8 is serious one.
        You can google "wild boar attack injuries", but I don't recommend it unless you really hated today's breakfast 🙂
        You can also see that unless you headshot it, it takes several bullets to stop even smaller ones.
        So, axe or knife will just make it more angry and best thing to do is to dodge first attack and climb a tree – boars don't climb 🙂

        Good news is, serious attacks in forrest outside of a hunt are very, very rare. You are much more likely to get attacked in a city since boars are rapidly expanding into urban areas and they adapt extremely quickly and since they are not challenged in urban areas, they loose fear and tend to attack far more often then in forrest.

        In forrest, boar will smell you when you get out of the car 🙂
        There are two realistic options which can be dangerous:
        1. you move against wind very quietly and you bump into boar surprising it – even then will most likely run, but it can charge at least once
        2. you bump into little pigs – if you don't see a mom, just go back – don't change direction, go back. She is always around and little pigs tend to stray away a bit so it might seem they are alone. They never are. And you are only sure she is not in the direction you came from, because you would know if she were 🙂
        If mom is with them, she will take them away, unless you surprise them – which is rare, but possible and very dangerous.
        Female hog also has tusks, much smaller but has them and she likes to charge and bite.
        Since they are heavy and fast, they behave like biting ramming trucks – which is also their weakness – you can dodge it and kick it with your feet.
        Female hog can be very aggressive, but she is not attacking you actively, she is protecting the young, so basically, you just get away and try to avoid attacks or – again – climb a small tree.

        So, hiking, mushroom picking … you are likely loud and smelly enough to deter any wild boar in your path, but it's not without possible danger – but that stands for every wild animal, really. A roe buck can be quite dangerous and a deer can be deadly as well.
        But these are all extreme situations, usually when animal is startled (which is rare) and situation causes it to go into fight mode instead of flight mode (even rarer).

        Wild boars are actually much more dangerous in urban areas than in forrest.

      • And just a note, boar tracks can easily get mixed with roe deer (smaller tracks) or red deer (larger tracks).
        Boar tracks have specific arc-like shapes on "heel". However, roe deer and red deer has the same if terrain is muddy and soft. So it takes some practice to distinguish them, I still have trouble sometimes.

          • Indeed. However, you don't actually need a lot of wild boars to make a lot of mess. For instance, a single herd of 6-7 pigs can mess up area of a soccer field in a single night. In a week they can turn over entire hill if they really like whats' there 🙂

            Anyway, as you said in an article and I agree – ticks are actually far more dangerous than wild boars 🙂

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