Brachiation

[caters]

Brachiation is arm over arm swinging seen in humans, orangutans, gibbons, and monkeys. Chimpanzees, bonobos, and gorillas all have anatomical features that allow brachiation but they don't often brachiate.

I have heard that in prehistoric times brachiation helped humans ambush their prey.

The only problem I see with brachiation besides your arms getting tired is that in the wild, trees are not often big enough to support a human, not even a brachiating human. Orangutans have solved this problem by holding their weight over multiple branches, even multiple trees and vines while brachiating. Monkeys are so light that they don't need to do this when they brachiate.

Plus if an average human arm is about 2 to 3 feet long from shoulder to fingertip then that means that the forest would have to be pretty dense for a human to brachiate without leaping. And even if we took the orangutan's strategy of brachiating so that we could brachiate without leaping between trees that are 6-8 ft apart(which is the maximum distance a squirrel can leap from branch to branch) there would still be the problem of possibly dislocating your shoulder from stretching too much or worse, breaking your arm from falling off.

So would brachiation help Lisa on her hunts or should she stick to hunting on the ground? I can see how brachiation would help and that is that if Lisa brachiates, her prey is less likely to see her and thus there would be less adrenaline in the meat and adrenaline makes meat taste bad. But then again brachiation in the trees makes rustling sounds and when prey hears a rustling sound they think "Oh, no a predator is after me. I better run or defend myself." Also Lisa might not see her prey if she goes high enough. Lisa is very good at not making a single sound on the ground but has never tried hunting in the trees. She has however climbed trees ever since she was very young and still loves climbing trees even though her main form of transport is walking and her civilization is mostly underground.

So should she try brachiating and hunting in the trees or should she stick to hunting on the ground?

 

[Drakevarg]

I don't think any form of primate has ever used brachiation as a primary means of hunting - its main purpose is specifically to stay well out of reach of predators. That said, I could see its use as an ambush tactic when the opportunity presents itself. Most humans - and most animals in general, I'd imagine - simply don't look up very often.

But in terms of practicality and safety and whatnot - I don't see it as that much of an issue. If she's in really good shape and used to doing it, brachiation would just be like doing extreme monkey bars. There's the risk of grabbing a weak branch or whatever and suffering the effects of gravity, but that's a risk inherent in any form of extreme gymnastics. If you do it regularly you'd cultivate an instinct to be able to calculate the safety of any given motion as you go, and a skill for landing with relative safety. There's always a risk, but the same can be said of riding a bike.

 

[KC Trae Becker]

Lisa could wait in trees for ambush so as to not alert her prey. If she uses a spear or a bow, the extra height could be a huge advantage in hunting. It certainly is helpful in spotting prey.

If it helps I've just been rereading Kipling's Jungle Book as a bedtime story to my son. Kipling has 17 year old Mowgli brachiate for fun.

When it's important and dangerous, he plans it out to make sure he'll have close enough trees of sufficient size to pull off the distance he needs.

Kipling spent many years in India and seems to try to be mostly reasonable with his science, other than animals talking to other species and making laws, etc.

 

[Jerseydevil]

I've never heard of Brachiation being used for hunting with humans. I'm not saying its' impossible, but it's probably not practical. It may be used as a form of locomotion through the trees for very limited circumstances, but not much else, and even that's a stretch. If the tree branch can support a person hanging from it, that person could just as easily sit on it with much less effort and strain on the delicate shoulder joint (more on that later). Also, it depends on what type of weapon is being used. Anything requiring two hands (bow and arrow, rifle, etc) will obviously not be practical. If it is thrown, like a spear, there will be almost no leverage produced. A spear, or anything else thrown for that matter, requires the thrower to push off of the ground and twist the body for it to gain sufficient momentum. If the person is just hanging, at most they can only fling the object with almost no force.

This brings up another point. The reason humans can throw things is that we lack a certain bone in the shoulder joint that stabilizes it. Most primates have this, which reinforces the shoulder as they swing through the trees. Falling and then grabbing a branch as one falls can produce extreme amounts of force that a human shoulder simply cannot tolerate. For example, I weigh 160 lbs. Jumping from one branch to another moving at 7mph would put a strain of over 1000 lbs on a very fragile joint (Force=mass x acceleration). It may become dislocated, which is very, very painful and renders the arm next to useless, if the bones do not simply break. The good part is that lacking this bone allows full rotation and extension, making throwing things at high speeds possible. Most primates can't throw like we can, instead they simply fling the object in the vague direction with almost no force produced. To throw effectively, there has to be something to push off of, which will be difficult while balancing in a tree.

Honestly, in a survival situation, hunting on the ground with a makeshift blind would be much more effective, simpler, and less hazardous.