Suicide is the voluntary taking of one's own life. The reasons for such an act in people can be mental illness, loss of the meaning of life, pursuing failure and humiliation by others, the loss of a loved one. These reactions are inherent in humans, but I wonder if there have been cases of suicide in the animal kingdom?
Lemmings
A fairly widespread myth is that lemmings once a few years huddle in flocks in order to follow the leader to a cliff or water barrier, where their voluntary death awaits them. Such actions are allegedly aimed at reducing the extremely increased population size and protecting the species from extinction. However, in fact, these small animals prefer to live alone, do not have a leader and swim well. The latest observations of scientists have shown that the sharp decline in the number of lemmings is not due to animal suicides. In crowded conditions, males become more aggressive and begin to kill cubs, thereby regulating the number of individuals.
Whales
A sad sight - several huge majestic creatures lie on the ground, dying under the weight of their own bodies. Whales are washed ashore in many parts of the world, singly or in groups. Scientists find it difficult to name the exact reason for this behavior, but they believe that the point here is not a desire to commit suicide. "Suspects" are the noise from submarines, malfunctions in the magnetic compass of animals, and diseases. These factors can cause disorientation of animals, as a result of which they end up on land.
Cases of whales being thrown onto land were recorded back in ancient Greece, so it is impossible to blame only modern technologies for this.
Zombie animals
A grasshopper who jumped into a pond and drowned there, or an ant pretending to be a berry so that the birds would peck it up - is not suicide, and, in the case of the same ant, invented with a fair amount of imagination. However, insects do not behave in this way voluntarily. They are coerced by the parasites that have occupied their body. In the case of the grasshopper, the culprit is the hairy worm larva. An adult worm needs water where it can reproduce, so it forces its owner to deliver it there. And nematodes living in juvenile American ants need to enter the body of birds to complete the cycle. Therefore, they make the backs of their hosts red, like berries, and make them sit phlegmatically on the branches, instead of trying to escape when danger appears.
Often, parasites not only change the behavior of their host, pushing him to death, but also make them protect their offspring before death.
Mystical
Not all cases of death of animals, reminiscent of suicide, have been successfully explained by scientists. For example, in Scotland there is a bridge called Overtown, from which dogs regularly jump. Most falls from a fifteen-meter height end in the death of the dog, but some persistent suicides have done it twice.
