Both of them attack. It’s just that carnivores treat it as you owe them money.
And herbivores treat it as they owe you money.
Comment on Assumptions
Seleni@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
Who started the assumption that herbivores were all sweet harmless cuddle bugs anyhow? Because they had obviously never interacted with a large herbivore before.
Jankatarch@lemmy.world 4 hours ago
Mirshe@lemmy.world 15 hours ago
People are gored by bison at Yellowstone every year. When I visited a few years ago, the rangers were actively having to tell people to avoid an elk who, with his harem, had decided to hang out in Fort Yellowstone for a couple days. People are dumb, or don’t think “wow that’s a 600+ lb animal the size of a minivan”.
ryathal@sh.itjust.works 14 hours ago
Most people aren’t ever really exposed to nature. You can have a cuddly dairy cow, but that’s not universal. Most encounters people have are going to be with animals that are docile and used to human interactions.
Also it is a little counter intuitive at first. Predators will retreat from a fight of it’s not worth the effort. Prey doesn’t retreat once the fight starts, because it’s literally life or death for them.
Manjushri@piefed.social 12 hours ago
Far from universal. About 20 people die per year in the USA from attacks by cows. They are huge powerful animals that don’t generally don’t give a shit about people (they’re used to them, for the most part) but if they decide you are a threat to them or their calf, you’re fucked.
ryathal@sh.itjust.works 12 hours ago
There’s also a huge difference between beef cows and dairy cows.
smh@slrpnk.net 8 hours ago
My understanding: dairy cows interact with humans on a regular basis, for dairy stuff. Beef animals don’t interact with humans nearly as much.