Mother Nature gave out all the right tools for everything to survive in the dog-eat-dog world we live in. Case in point were the survival instincts given to prey animals to successfully negotiate the fundamental trade-off between predation and starvation. A recent study was conducted to look into the subtle mechanisms of the whole predator and prey scenario.

The study was published by The Royal Society and was conducted by the School of Biological Sciences in the University of Bristol. It takes a look at the prey instincts of the European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) and how the birds were sensitive to a predator's head orientation and eye-gaze direction as a subtle but useful indicator of risk.

This observation was derived from starlings caught in the wild and placed in the presence of human "predators", whose frontal appearance and gaze were manipulated independently. The starlings were sensitive to the predator's orientation, the presence of eyes and the direction of the gaze.

The birds also responded in a functionally significant manner: when the predator's gaze was averted, starlings resumed feeding at a higher rate and consumed more food. When the risk was removed, the animal then gained a competitive advantage against its peers and do not respond to the subtle predator cue in its way.