Dickie Genung, age 10, of Goodlettsvie, Tenn, for the question:
Why do the lemmings swim out to sea?
Sometimes hordes of little lemmings seem to be following an invisible Pied Piper. The Eskimos saw them and so did the people of Norway. They were sure that the furry little fellows fell with the flurrying snow flakes. Early naturalists thought that the small animals ware returning to the home of their ancestors: In any case, the Pied Piper or the ancestral home must have been under the sea. For that is where the scurrying army always ended.
The lemming of our far north is a brown animal. The lemming of Scandinavia is golden yellow with either a dark stripe down his back or a cap and collar of glossy black. The coat of rich soft fur is long enough to hide the ears. The lemming is a vole, a bobtailed cousin of the field mouse. He is five inches long, plus a one inch tail.
Lemming food includes grass, mosses and all sorts of small plants. The small creature never eats meat. His nest is a hollow in the ground, often blanketed with snow. For the lemming’s thick fur coat protects him from the cold. He can live under the snow, feeding on hidden mosses and small plants. He may even rear his family under the snow. The babies arrive five or six at a time, one litter after another. The lemming multiplies at a great rate ‑ which is the root of his trouble.
In a few years, the lemming population in a given area is over crowded. There is not enough food to go around. The natural thing to do is to move out and find new territory. This is just what the lemmings decide to do.
About every four years, countless lemmings leave home to seek new feeding grounds. Only a few stay behind in the old territory. The rest pour forth over the countryside and march on and on and on. The migration may take weeks or even a year. They stop to eat and Mama may stop to raise a new litter.
The migration continues over hill and dale, across streams and rivers. Lemmings are good swimmers and not afraid of water. News of the moving army reaches the ears, eyes and noses of the meat eating animals. Here is food for the taking.
Stoats, bears and cats pounce with tooth and claw. Gulls, hawks and owls swoop down from above. The lemmings that remain keep right on going.
At last the fur coated army reaches the sea. This is water, the same stuff they crossed a dozen times on the trip. The little creatures are not afraid. They mean to swim across and maybe on the other side there will be mossy pastures suitable for a new colony of lemmings.
They find their mistake too late. For they cannot cross the wide ocean. Countless little lemmings follow each other into the water, all to be swallowed up and drowned. If they had all lived, the world could not support their vast numbers. Meantime, enough lemmings are left behind to keep the population growing.