Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!bellcore!faline!thumper!ulysses!andante!princeton!udel!gatech!uflorida!mailrus!ames!ucsd!sdcc6!calmasd!jnp
From: jnp@calmasd.GE.COM (John Pantone)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Squirrel Questions
Message-ID: <83@calmasd.GE.COM>
Date: 30 Sep 88 21:04:34 GMT
References: <22811@mordor.s1.gov> <4150@polya.Stanford.EDU>
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Organization: GE/Calma, 9805 Scranton Rd., San Diego, CA 92121
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In-reply-to: ray@polya.Stanford.EDU's message of 28 Sep 88 23:44:01 GMT


(Ray Baxter) writes:
  >(Loren Petrich) writes:
  >>	I once saw a squirrel jump with a drop of over six feet (onto
  >>a carpeted floor, I might add), and run off as if nothing had
  >>happened. Is such durability typical of small animals? If so, then it
  >>would be an outcome of the square-cube law, in which smaller animals
  >>have a larger drag force (~area~length^2) per unit mass
  >>(~volume~length^3).
  >Six feet is not all that far; humans, chimps and large cats can all
  >handle it.  But I take your point, smaller animals, squirrels especially
  >seem especially graceful about it.  It think that adaptation is more
  >likely to be the cause of this grace than the proportion of drag to mass.

I think that F=ma is more likely to be the explanation.  The
acceleration of gravity is the same for a large and small animal - but
their mass is rather dramatically different (by the cube).  Small
animals simply don't hit with that much force.  A dog here in CA
recently survived a fall from several stories up a condo - with no ill
effects (except, I hope, a better appreciation for heights :-)

-- 
These opinions are solely mine and in no way reflect those of my employer.  
John M. Pantone @ GE/Calma R&D, 9805 Scranton Rd., San Diego, CA 92121
...{ucbvax|decvax}!sdcsvax!calmasd!jnp   jnp@calmasd.GE.COM   GEnie: J.PANTONE