I once saw one of Sir David Attenborough's nature documentaries.
It was about a cycle of parasite that existed mostly in birds.
I think the process was that a snail or slug would get infected by the parasite by digging through bird feces.
The infection caused a very strange behavior. The slug's skin would shift in sickly bright colors (looked very sick, but was visible to a bird) and it would crawl onto a leaf.
Basically, it went into the open, making itself a VERY easy and attractive target to a bird.
And when a bird took the bait and ate the suicidal slug...
The parasite got back inside of a bird, it's favorite home, until the cycle repeated again.
You know...
I once saw one of Sir David Attenborough's nature documentaries.
It was about a cycle of parasite that existed mostly in birds.
I think the process was that a snail or slug would get infected by the parasite by digging through bird feces.
The infection caused a very strange behavior. The slug's skin would shift in sickly bright colors (looked very sick, but was visible to a bird) and it would crawl onto a leaf.
Basically, it went into the open, making itself a VERY easy and attractive target to a bird.
And when a bird took the bait and ate the suicidal slug...
The parasite got back inside of a bird, it's favorite home, until the cycle repeated again.
So the idea that a parasite can alter BEHAVIOR...
Well. Maybe so.