- related:: [[2020-11-10 Pigs]] (boar hunting) [[2021-06-21 Fungus]] (reindeer hunters) # Hunting > Hunting has been a pretty important aspect of people's lives for a really long time, but it doesn't show up often in fiction. Oh, you see it in the occasional medieval European style fantasy, or off-handedly referenced in something like the Pern books, but for something that's pretty important and exciting, it still doesn't show up much. Maybe because "man vs. beast" stories tend to be less popular than "man vs. man" plots? Regardless, I realized that part of the reason I don't write a lot of hunting stories is that I don't know a that much about hunting, so I did a little research... ## Quick Facts - Hunter-gatherers may have [used ravens as scouts](https://www.jstor.org/stable/26596516), a role also perform for wolves, who they generally like better than us. %% [[ravens are effective scouts for hunters]] %% - Human hunters inventing fishtail spear tips is probably responsible for [the extinction of American megafauna](https://www.conicet.gov.ar/human-beings-may-be-much-more-responsible-for-the-megafaunal-extinction/) during the Neolithic era. %% related: [[elephants were popular prey for Neolithic humans]] %% - Although women typically seem like passive observers in Medieval hunting tapestries, there are a bunch of records of ladies _poaching_ deer, and they probably did do [a fair amount of hunting](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1468-0424.2012.01681.x), although perhaps not much of the "high-prestige" kind known as "hunting par force." %% [[richardsonRidingAlexanderHunting2012.pdf]] %% - Scholars think the Greek story of the Calydonian Boar Hunt may have been influenced by Scythian folklore. %% [[The Amazons by Adrienne Mayor#ch00p9 Calydonian Boar Hunt]] %% - The earliest evidence of leashes for hunting dogs [comes from Arabia](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0278416517301174) around the 7th millennium BCE, before the spread of pastoralism. ## The Flush of Success Successful hunters who are also fathers wind up with more testosterone. This is similar to what's experienced by men who win games, sports competitions, or promotions at work. This is true even if they weren't personally involved in the sporting event or making the kill. The elevated testosterone might help reinforce the desire to hunt, but mostly this indicates that human hunting behaviors are motivated by a desire to feed one's family, rather than gaining status. %% [[trumbleSuccessfulHuntingIncreases2014.pdf]] %% ## Low Risk, Fine Reward Although people often think of hunting as an activity for male hunter-gatherers (with females doing the gathering), Martu (part-time Aboriginal foragers from Australia's Western Desert) women do most of the monitor lizard hunting, which accounts for about a third of their diet. The women spend most of their foraging time hunting lizards. First they burn away vegetation to find the lizard dens, then dig them out of the dens and chase them into places they can't burrow. The men mostly hunt kangaroo, which are a less reliable source of food. %% [[jonesKillKangarooUnderstanding2013.pdf]] %% ## Net Hunting The BaAka (pygmies) are considered [premier net hunters](http://www.traveladventures.org/continents/africa/baaka-net-hunting.html). Both genders participate in the hunt, which begins by setting up a big circular net structure; the [net is about a kilometer long](https://rainforests.mongabay.com/07-rainforest-people.html). Generally the women flush the game into the nets, while the men use their spears to kill the animals, but it's not a strict division from what I can tell. Not all hunts are successful. %% [[how net hunting works]] %% ## Mixed Economies This [article about the interactions between human and animals in the Neolithic era](https://peoplingthepast.com/2021/04/30/blog-post-25-lindsay-der-on-human-animal-entanglements-in-the-neolithic/) says things like "the people of Çatalhöyük practiced a mixed economy: they farmed sheep and goat and cultivated wild cereals, while still gathering wild plants and hunting wild animals like deer, boar, horses and aurochs" but what always amuses me is that, honestly, this was true of the people of Appalachia within the last hundred years, too. For an interesting look at a mixed economy in the process of shifting away from hunting, check out this [Brazilian example](https://doi.org/10.1186/1746-4269-5-36).