Ethology involves the observation of animal behaviour in natural environments, uncontrolled or manipulated by human effort. Ethological studies followed the European tradition in psychology where etiologists looked at manifest behaviour of animals from an evolutionary point of view and tried to understand and explain a particular animal behaviour in the context of instinctual survival.
World-famous ethologists, Lorenz and Morris, through their observation of ducks and other animals in uncontrolled environments concluded that some part of animal behaviour is genetically determined, such that it seems to have been ‘hard wired’ in the system of the animal.
Lorenz et al conclusively determined four criteria on which to base their assertion. Firstly, the observable behaviour is always stereotypical, such that it always appears in the same, identical manner. Secondly, the behaviour is species-specific –i.e., only animals of the same species manifest it. Thirdly, those animals of the same species that have been isolated from others and thus have had no chance to learn instinctive behaviours exhibit the same behaviour. Finally, even those animals exhibit instinctive behaviour who have been prevented from practising it.
In the last thirty years or so there has emerged some strong evidence from ethological studies that supports the genetically determined hypothesis of animal behaviour. Research by other ethologists corroborates the above-mentioned criteria for instinctive behaviour in animals. For example, Grohmaan identified all the four criteria while observing pigeon behaviour. Nice observed the same phenomenon in sparrows. Carmichael saw the same facts to be operative in tadpoles.
Ethological research on animals in Pakistan has also contributed valuable findings on animal behaviour. A two-volume book, “The Birds of Pakistan”, by TJ Roberts, published in 1991, contains detailed descriptions of Pakistani birds and is an all-encompassing guide for an ethologist interested in Pakistani birds.
Topics on body length, wingspan, habitat, distribution and status, habits, breeding biology and vocalisation are extensively covered in the book. The section in the book on Lesser Whistling Teal, or Lesser Tree Duck, contains a reference to the sighting of a nest on the “Crocodile Island” on Haleji Lake, where two bird-lovers Khan Mohammad Khan and Syed Asad Ali are reported to have found a nest of a teal containing 27 eggs.
I had the privilege of knowing Mr Syed Asad Ali from the mid-seventies until his untimely demise. I had just come back from the States when a common friend introduced us. Syed Asad Ali, or Shah Jee as everyone called him, attended Government College, Lahore, and Harvard University for a short stint, after which he joined the family business. He was an astute and perceptive entrepreneur, a connoisseur of classical music, a gourmet par excellence, a nature lover, a totally devoted husband, a doting, loving father, a committed friend and above all a gentleman to the core.
He was fond of bird-watching and could be called a Pakistani ethologist. During his summer breaks from work in Karachi, where he also lived, and in his frequent visits to Lahore, where his parents and other close relatives lived, he would travel up north, in and around Murree hills, shooting birds, not with a gun but with a camera and peeking at their habitats through his powerful binoculars. Then again during summer and winter breaks he would travel by car to visit different natural bird habitats in and around the Khinjar, Manchar and Haleji lakes in Sindh.
It is in comparison to such world-renowned ethologists, like Lorenz that one misses people like Syed Asad Ali, who, given time and opportunity, would have discovered new and fascinating things about birds of Pakistan, contributing to the growing science of ethology.
Humair Hashmi is a consulting psychologist who teaches at Imperial College Lahore