ABSTRACT
Ethologists have accustomed us to the concept of the pecking order (Lorenz, 1966) in animals, administered in the vast majority of cases by the males of various species. This order is reflected in the behavior of primates (McLean, 1973; Sagan, 1977), as well as that of mammals that rank lower on the evolutionary scale. Primates adapted to the open fields, such as baboons and macaques, show distinct domination-submission types of behavior (Starr, 1971), not only in the drastically different sizes of males and females, but in the pecking order of the males themselves. Among wolves, adaptation in the interest of survival is demonstrated in the totally submissive response of the weaker, smaller, or younger wolf, who lies on his back in a completely vulnerable posture when play between him and a dominant wolf reaches the point of the possibility of a dangerous attack by the latter. On the assumption of the vulnerable position by the submissive male, the dominant male stops threatening the submissive one. Needless to say, the females are regularly dominated by the males. Among birds, the pecking order is a matter of common knowledge. Again, the males are usually the dominant ones, although as in kites and crows, the female mates of dominant males may lord it over lower male members of the pecking order.
