The Chipmunk a Carnivore?

Here's one for the weird category...

A few summers ago,  I happened to witness something quite odd.

Along a path in the woods I saw a Chipmunk. Now understandably, this in itself is nothing overly astounding, but the way in which this Chipmunk behaved was.  I quietly watched from only a few meters away, as a Chipmunk repeatedly attacked a rather large Bull Frog. The Chipmunk was so thoroughly engrossed in its assault that it either didn't notice me or it didn't care that I was there.  My mind raced for answers as to why the Chipmunk would be focusing so much aggression towards the Frog. As I tried to come up with answers, the Chipmunk continued its relentless and savage advances on the frog.  Although it attempted to retreat on several occasions, the Frog was clearly going to be killed if I didn't step in. However, I chose not to because I didn't want to meddle with nature's natural course of events. And yet, as I watched the Chipmunk dart in and puncture the Frog's skin in a succession of vicious charges I began to wonder just exactly how normal this behaviour really was. After all, Chipmunks are classified as herbivorous creatures and certainly not meat eaters... or so I and the rest of the scientific community thought.

 In fact the Chipmunk is loved by millions of people as a cute, friendly, relatively tame, if not cheeky rodent, who relishes consuming peanuts from the palm of one's hand. There was no doubt though, that the Chipmunk I saw that day would surely have been more accurately described as "the Chipmunk from hell"... literally "a killer Chipmunk."

 I have witnessed few attacks by wild creatures (large or small) that matched the ferocity of the attack launched by this little rodent.

My curiosity was overwhelming so I continued to watch this spectacle, my mind searching for some clue as to what, if anything, had prompted this aggression.

My questions were answered some minutes later as I watched the Chipmunk drag the dead Frog off into some shrubbery and begin to consume it. I couldn't believe what I was seeing! Who had ever heard of a carnivorous Chipmunk!

However, upon looking into the matter further, I discovered, based on recent research, that on very rare occasion the odd Chipmunk has been known to turn carnivorous. It goes to show that just when science thinks its got the behaviour of an animal pegged and pretty much fully understood, something like this comes along and blows commonly held assumptions clean out of the water.

From what I understand, the observation that Chipmunks occasionally turn carnivorous was only made in the last few years only because it is such a rare behavioural trait. Aside from this, all I can say is that I'll never look at a chipmunk in the same way again.

As I watched the Chipmunk attack the Frog, I was thinking that its behaviour was  such a drastic departure from anything considered "normal" that most would have immediately deduced it was rabid. Yet, this is another classic example of where science assumed that a chipmunk's parameters of behaviour are predictable and constant, and do not deviate from a rigid framework of basic functions similar to the way a machine might work; something designed to carry out only specific tasks.

However things are slowly changing. Some biologists are adopting a wiser philosophy which takes the view that no animal behaviour is absolute all of the time.

There is a growing realization that exceptions to the rule should always be postulated, depending on circumstances and situations, just as in this case regarding the Frog and the Chipmunk.