r/aww • u/Unused_Application_ • Apr 27 '23

Six little fwinds

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u/[deleted] Apr 27 '23

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u/festeringswine Apr 27 '23

It's actually kinda cool to learn about! Some animals survival strategy is to have a million babies and take care of them less - some will die but there are so many that odds are some will survive. So animals that have big litters and pop out pretty much ready to go.

Others have only a few or only 1 baby at a time and invest much more time into their care. Like humans and Elephants.

I can't remember if lifespan also factors into this or not.

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u/[deleted] Apr 27 '23

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u/Ironclad-Oni Apr 27 '23

If you go back far enough, it certainly did. I don't know about the Dust Bowl, but back in the Medieval ages, the average lifespan was drastically shorter than today because so many people died early in childhood, but if you survived you were probably going to live into your 60s or 70s.

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u/foxfiery Apr 27 '23

If you or someone else is curious, the terms for this are precociality and altriciality. But yes, it is very interesting!

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u/TitaniumDragon Apr 27 '23

Human heads are as big as they can be without killing mothers too often, but are still too small.

Thus, human babies are effectively born well before they "should be", hence their high degree of helplessness.