Question map
Consider the following animals : 1. Hedgehog 2. Marmot 3. Pangolin To reduce the chance of being captured by predators, which of the above organisms rolls up/roll up and protects/protect its/their vulnerable parts?
Explanation
The correct answer is Option 4 (1 and 3) because both the Hedgehog and the Pangolin employ the specific behavioral adaptation of rolling into a tight ball to deter predators.
- Hedgehogs: When threatened, they use powerful back muscles to curl up, tucking their head, tail, and legs into a ball. This exposes only their sharp, keratinous spines, making it nearly impossible for a predator to reach their vulnerable underbelly.
- Pangolins: These mammals are covered in hard, overlapping scales. Upon sensing danger, they roll into a firm ball, protecting their soft stomach. Their scales act as armor, and the sharp edges can even inflict cuts on a persistent predator.
- Marmots: Unlike the others, Marmots are large ground squirrels that rely on vigilance and alarm whistles. They retreat into deep burrows for safety rather than rolling into a ball, as they lack physical armor like spines or scales.
Therefore, while all three have defense mechanisms, only the Hedgehog and Pangolin utilize the "rolling up" strategy.
PROVENANCE & STUDY PATTERN
Guest previewThis is a classic 'Nature Watch' question that bypasses standard textbooks. It relies on the 'News Anchor' (Pangolin was heavily discussed in 2020-21 due to trafficking/COVID) and 'General Awareness' (Hedgehog). The strategy is to use the news-based animal to anchor your logic and apply common sense anatomy to the others.
This question can be broken into the following sub-statements. Tap a statement sentence to jump into its detailed analysis.
- Page title and question explicitly link hedgehog defense to curling behavior.
- The page groups 'curl into a ball' behaviour with predator-defense topics, implying the curl is a defensive response.
- Related question on the same site explicitly asks why hedgehogs curl into a ball when scared, tying curling to fear/defense.
- Listing of related predator-defense questions implies curling is a known protective behavior.
Describes a biological use of 'rolling' (leaf margins roll up) as a mechanical response to trap and isolate an organism.
A student could generalize that rolling or curling can serve defensive or containment functions and look for animals that curl to protect body parts.
Explains that movement can be a response to environmental changes and used to an organism's advantage (e.g., avoid threat).
A student could treat curling into a ball as a movement triggered by threat and check ethology sources or field observations for such threat-response behaviors in hedgehogs.
Describes animal defensive adaptations (camouflage, tusks, strength) that reduce vulnerability to predators.
A student could categorize curling into a ball as another defensive adaptation and compare it with listed defenses to assess plausibility.
Discusses how protection (parental care) affects survival chances, illustrating the general principle that protective behaviours/structures improve survival.
Use the general survival-benefit principle to hypothesize that a behaviour like curling would be beneficial against predators and then seek species-specific evidence.
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