Animal Energy - Meerkat

Meerkat - Vigilance

Keywords:

Group dynamics and social hierarchy, knowing where you stand, vigilance, alertness, staying on watch, shiftwork, concepts of female energy and feminism, needing and depending on your family, desert and sand wisdom, issues relating to attachment, 'people who need people.'

General Description:

The meerkat is a small member of the mongoose, found in the Kalahari desert. They are a burrowing mammal, making underground tunnels and spaces that are connected by many entrances. Clans of meerkats form based on social structure, and changing shifts as different meerkats assume sentry duty for approximately an hour to protect foraging meerkats from predators. Meerkat sentries make alarm calls when the clan is threatened, and will sometimes make quieter vocalisations when nothing is wrong. They are insectivores, but will take anything they can bring down, and that is available, being opportunistic hunters. Along with sentry duty, meerkats will also babysit each other's young, and grooming each other to strengthen bonds.