Behavior: Animals That Kill Their Young

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When a new male ascends to power, pregnant females use deceit in an attempt to save their unborn young from his later attack: they demonstrate estrus behavior to the new leader, presumably to trick him into thinking the future offspring are his. But once the new male shows that he is determined to kill the infants, the mothers abandon their young. Though they could gang up on the male or refuse to copulate with him after infanticide, Hrdy notes, it is always in their individual self-interest to break ranks and accept him. Reason: their own male offspring will eventually benefit from the infanticidal trait.

Hrdy's portrait of the langurs is a far cry from the traditional view of animals as social creatures that act to ensure group survival. But as Lorenz's work was, it is in tune with its times. In stressing chaotic individualism at the expense of the group. The Langurs of Abu reads like a jungle version of Tom Wolfe's essay on The Me Decade.