We could learn a lot from squirrels

I struggled mightily to decide what to write this month. As a writing prompt, I often ask myself what’s on my mind or what’s happening in the world that’s likely on the minds of my readers. Ultimately, I decided there were two things that were hard to miss right now: fall colors and the looming election. 

The former I love, the latter I loathe. It’s not the election itself I dislike, but the discourse ahead of it. It’s not been pretty, has it? 

So today, I’m retreating to the woods in hopes of finding, well…hope.

It’s a beautiful fall day. I’m in the woods, on a platform in a tree. It’s the golden hour when the light brings out the true radiance of the leaf colors and the woods glow with a vibrancy that no picture can do justice. Deer will be moving soon. Hence my location up in this tree. 

Then I hear it. A scritch-scritching behind me. Always behind me. Why is that? It’s movement in the dry leaves. Close. My heart rate increases. I turn slowly and expect (okay, hope) to see antlers.

Nope. 

Another dang squirrel doing his squirrel thing. Collecting acorns and making noise in the woods. I relax and turn back a bit too abruptly. He sees me turn, runs up a nearby tree, and starts barking incessantly. Now the whole woods, and all the deer in it, knows that there’s an interloper in their midst. 

Thanks, squirrel. Thanks a lot. 

But it gets me to thinking about the way different species interact with each other in the wild and I wonder what lessons we can glean from watching them. We’re taught that it’s “survival of the fittest” and competition drives adaptation and evolution. And while that’s certainly true early in the evolution of things, I’m seeing more and more that the “survival of the fittest” concept is only part of the equation. What I see, and a growing body of scientific research supports, is that cooperation is as important, if not more so, to survival than any amount of competition. 

Yet our stance these days is that of “us versus them” or “for me to win, you have to lose” or “I’m right, you’re wrong. Full stop.”

And as much as we would like to take comfort in the binary, that’s not how the natural world works. And good thing, too. Because if everything was simply black and white, there’d be no color. 

Back to the woods. What’s in it for that squirrel to bark out a warning that a potential threat exists? If the deer survive because of it, they’re bound to eat some of the squirrel’s acorns. So will pretty much everything else in the forest. So what does the squirrel stand to gain?  

Maybe he knows that the other species have his back, too. Let’s say I was a bit stealthier in that tree and he didn’t see me. It’s equally as likely that a deer would walk downwind of me and sound an alarm because it caught my scent, something a squirrel can’t do (at least, I don’t think squirrels have that great a sense of smell). When the deer snorts and stomps and flags that white tail, it also tells the woods in its own way that something is amiss. 

Are these animals just doing this for the benefit of their own kind? I don’t believe so, and many researchers agree. Cooperation and reciprocation are as powerful and prevalent in nature, maybe more so, than competition. 

Consider this: Ravens lead wolves to potential prey and they both get to eat. Remoras and wrasses swim around inside sharks’ mouths and clean their teeth. Clownfish living in the stinging tentacles of sea anemones get protection for sharing food. Flowers give nectar for bees spreading pollen. Oaks feed squirrels and squirrels plant oaks. 

The list goes on and on. 

It's long been my argument that we as a species only got this far because of our ability to work together. Alone in the wild, humans are less adapted to survival than most species on the planet. Watch any of those survival shows on TV and you’ll see what I mean. 

But together, we’re unstoppable. When we cooperate, when we truly work together, there’s almost no limit to what we can accomplish. Everything we have, from our neighborhoods to democracy, is because of our ability to work together. 

Yet here we are, the most “evolved” species in the most “advanced” country on the planet doing everything we can to divide ourselves. I really believe that deep down, we feel like this discourse is not right, yet we’ve built systems around perpetuating it (anyone been on social media lately?). I contend that the average American doesn’t fully agree with either side of the binary political system we’ve created and is generally left to choose between what they feel are the lesser of only two unsavory choices. 

Maybe there are more rational voices out there. We wouldn’t know because that wouldn’t generate clicks, views, or algorithm selection. And so we feel compelled to adopt the stance of “my way or the highway” and “if you’re not with us, you’re against us” when really what we want - what our evolution demands of us - is to ask, “how do we succeed together?" 

In that respect, I think we could learn a lot from squirrels.  

This is the monthly "Living Land" column I write for the local newspapers here in Des Moines County, Iowa.