Nature & Environment

Animals probably get drunk all the time, scientists claim

By T.K. Randall
November 1, 2024 ·  3 comments

Elephants are known to get drunk on fermented fruit. Image Credit: PD - Gorgo It's not just humans that get inebriated - members of the animal kingdom from monkeys to elephants are known to feast on fermenting fruit that can leave them a bit worse for wear to say the least.

But while the conventional view has long been that animals getting drunk in this way is a rare event, scientists have now come to the conclusion that this may in fact be a very common thing indeed.

Ethanol is present in almost all ecosystems, they argue, meaning that it is likely that a whole range of species have adapted to include it in their natural diets.

"We're moving away from this anthropocentric view that ethanol is just something that humans use," said Dr Kimberley Hockings of the University of Exeter."It's much more abundant in the natural world than we previously thought, and most animals that eat sugary fruits are going to be exposed to some level of ethanol."

Evidence suggests that, while animals likely possessed genes capable of metabolizing ethanol for many millions of years, this ability has since been fine-tuned by time and evolution.

"From an ecological perspective, it is not advantageous to be inebriated as you're climbing around in the trees or surrounded by predators at night - that's a recipe for not having your genes passed on," said Matthew Carrigan of the College of Central Florida.

"It's the opposite of humans who want to get intoxicated but don't really want the calories - from the non-human perspective, the animals want the calories but not the inebriation."


Source: Independent | Comments (3)

Tags: Animals, Drunk