You might assume that take drugs is a uniquely human behavior , but there are many members of the animal kingdom that go out of their way to satisfy their brains with psychoactive means with the ostensible intent of wring their perceptual experience of world . draw on it , as scientists like to call it , is a ubiquitous trait of life on satellite Earth .
Lions love catnip too
It will be no surprise to African tea owners that their pets will go crazy for catnip . The harmless high-pitched – which only affects around two - thirds of domestic kat – ordinarily lasts less than 30 minute and will lead in the cat experiencing bursts of hyperactivity , spacing out , purring , wandering behavior , and drowsiness . Basically , it ’s normal big cat behavior sprain up a nick .
It does n’t just give feline a high but alsohelps to ward offtroublesome insect like mosquito , suggesting their proclivity for the industrial plant has some evolutionary benefit .
It ’s known that this leafy industrial plant also has a mind - altering consequence on other felines , let in lions , leopard , and jaguars .
Catnip ( Nepeta cataria ) is a herb from the mint family that owes its trippy properties to nepetalactone . inscribe through the nozzle , the compoundworks onthe cat ’s opioid scheme , a bit like diacetylmorphine and morphine do in people .
Trippy Skippy: The wallaby opium crisis
talk of heroin , opium utilization is a big problem for Wallabies in Australia .
Tasmania is the world ’s largest manufacturer of lawfully grown opium for the pharmaceutical diligence , meaning the island is packed with poppy farm . regrettably , idle wallabies have been known to break into the battlefield , munch on the flowers , and get lapidate .
" We have a problem with brush kangaroo accede poppy fields , getting as gamy as a kite and going around in circles , " Lara Giddings , Tasmania Attorney - General , tolda budget sense of hearing in 2009 .
" Then they gate-crash , " tot Giddings . " We see craw traffic circle in the poppy diligence from wallabies that are high . "
Pass the pufferfish
It ’s often said that dolphin , along with humans , are some of the only animals to have sexual urge for recreation as well as procreation . However , sex is n’t their only vice .
The BBC documentary “ dolphinfish : Spy in the Pod ” showed how grouping of Bottlenose dolphins expend puffer fish to get a bombilation .
The high is thanks to a neurotoxin known as tetrodotoxin that the puffer Pisces use as maliciousness to stun prey . While this potent toxin can prove deadly , humble amounts of it come along to have a narcotic effect .
“ This was a case of new dolphins purposely experimenting with something we know to be elate . After chew the puffer gently and passing it round , they start dissemble most peculiarly , hanging around with their nose at the Earth’s surface as if intrigue by their own reflexion , ” Rob Pilley , a animal scientist who also worked as a manufacturer on the series , toldThe Sunday Timesin 2013 .
Drunken monkey hypothesis
There ’s a hypothesis that humans picked up their taste for strong drink due to ancient archpriest ancestors that dine out on to a fault ripe fruit that had ferment and produced ethanol . Even today , it ’s renowned that alcohol - drench yield is still actively scrounge by many primates , let in the black - handed spider monkeys of Panama .
The so - called"drunken imp " hypothesiswas first proposed by Professor Robert Dudley of the University of California at Berkeley . He argued that primates may have pick up to sniffle out fermented fruits tens of millions of years ago . Since ethanol bring on by fermented yield is a relatively light molecule that easy drifts in the wind , the primates determine to link the look of alcoholic beverage with intellectual nourishment .
Perhaps , Dudley suggested , this ancient relationship with ethyl alcohol part explains why mod - day humans have a tendency to pig out and clapperclaw inebriant too .
Drunk Dumbo
monkey are n’t the only animal that will actively go out of their means to go through alcohol . elephant are also famously big drunkard .
There ’s plenty of anecdotal and historical literature report elephants that have become intoxicated . There ’s an old legend that Buddha himself had to tame a drunken elephant that was promote the pits in a small Asian village .
In 1984 , astudylooked to scientifically affirm elephants ’ tendency for alcoholic beverage . Scientists gathered three Asiatic elephants and seven African elephant then demo them with an array of beverages with depart intoxicant content .
They found that the elephant “ readily drank a 7 percent alcohol answer in quantities sufficient to develop dramatic behavioral changes . ”
The test subjects did n’t seem overly drunk , but there was some hint that they were pleasantly chilled out by the experience .
“ Although the elephants here did not appear to a fault ‘ intoxicated ’ or ‘ intoxicated , ’ the absolute frequency and/or continuance of specific behaviour change dramatically . ab initio , ear flapping increase , revelatory of an increase in body temperature . However , both drink and washup , which normally increase when elephants are raging and uncomfortable , decreased , ” the survey generator write .
