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Scavengers Stay Healthy By Not Eating Their Own Kind, New Science Suggests

Nature is a cycle in which nothing is wasted and death leads to life.  When an animal dies, it becomes carrion, a source of nutriment that upholds ecosystems.  For example, a "whale fall" settling on the seafloor creates a thriving mini-environment for decades.  However, these hotspots also pose dangers to the opportunists that feed here, including the risk of pathogen transmission and predation.  Accordingly, it has long been suggested that scavengers avoid eating carcasses that are more closely related to them to reduce the risk of infection.  But the evidence to explore that idea is scarce and limited in scale.  So researchers recently expanded that scale, examining an essential gap in the ecology of some of nature's most derided denizens: those who scavenge.

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