🏠 Housing & Husbandry · 8 min
Taming, imprinting and raising wild
Why this matters
A tame animal is a dead animal on a delay. This is the part of husbandry where doing less is doing more.
By the end of this lesson you will be able to
- Distinguish taming from imprinting
- Apply techniques that prevent both
- Explain the role of conspecifics and surrogates
The tamer a wild animal is toward people, the less likely it is to survive. Animals that seek out human contact get hit by cars, shot, treated as pests, or presumed rabid. One of the rewards of this work is close contact with animals, and the more contact you have, the worse it usually is for them.
Avoiding taming
- Raise animals with others of their own species (conspecifics) whenever possible.
- Minimize unnecessary handling and exposure to people.
- Taper off handling once the young are feeding independently, and then avoid contact altogether.
- An adult or older juvenile of the same species can help socialize younger animals properly.
- Wild animals do not make good pets when hand-raised.
Imprinting
Imprinting is a process by which some birds, and perhaps some mammals, learn what species they are. Lorenz documented it in 1935: newly hatched ducklings instinctively follow the first large moving object they see and behave as though it is their mother. In many species this early, rapid learning lasts a lifetime, and when it comes time to seek a mate, the animal looks for something resembling what it imprinted on.
Why an imprinted animal is a lost animal
An imprinted bird seeks human company rather than its own species. When it comes time to reproduce it may try to mate with people, and such animals are often killed because people believe they are being attacked. Imprinted animals cannot reproduce effectively, and some argue their release does harm by competing with wild animals for resources.
Imprinting occurs before young birds leave the nest, and precocial species imprint much faster and younger than altricial species. Birds of prey will attempt to mate with the species they imprinted on, even if that species is not their own.
Surrogates
When an adult of the same species is not available, a mirror, a feather duster, or a mount can serve as a substitute, along with visual isolation from people during feeding. A feather duster works as a foster mother for precocial birds. The purpose is not comfort. It is to keep the young animal from concluding that it is a person.
The myth to correct on the phone
Birds have a very poorly developed sense of smell. A mother bird will not reject a chick because a human touched it. In mammals, smell is usually the most important sense for imprinting, finding food and other critical behaviors; in birds, vision usually is.
This lesson is part of the NY Wildlife Rehabilitator Exam course. Open it in the course to answer the retrieval checks that go with it, track what you have read, and quiz the whole unit. Lessons, quizzes and the glossary are free.