Cross Breeds

is it true that just before a diasaster, like an earthquake, Animals sometimes start to act funny.?

I've heard it said that before earthquakes, or other natural diasasters, animals will act more tense, some will run away, or start barking for no reason, Does anyone know if this is true or not, and can you give me examples Also, Can I please have a star, I want as many people as possible to see and answer this question. Thanks

Public Comments

1. Animals have a great sense of knowing things before they happen. House pets seem to know that their owner will be coming home, even before they arrive. They don’t receive any physical signals, but they still wait by the door or window to wait for their owner. Homing pigeons also use this ability although it is not fully understood. Many pet owners say that they have some sort of psychic bond or telepathic link with their pets. Some pets even act strangely before an earthquake hits. David Jay Brown, a graduate student was in a university laboratory with three calm rabbits. Suddenly, they became noticeably agitated. They were hopping around in their cages wildly for five minutes, and then a 5.2 earthquake hit the school! In China on February 4, 1975, the people of Haicheng were successfully evacuated right before a 7.3 magnitude earthquake hit the school! The decision to evacuate the city was taken primarily because of the strange behavior of animals. Most of the city was destroyed but all of the people in the city were evacuated before the earthquake. Almost 90,000 lives were saved. Some people say that they feel an uncomfortable pressure in their head or a persistent headache that lasts for weeks, which suddenly vanishes right before an earthquake. Magnetite has been found in some animal brains, so Berkland thinks that it‚ is possible that animals may be reacting to their own headaches caused by changes in the earth's electromagnetic field. He said that he saw a dog chewing on willow bark, from which aspirin was derived, before an earthquake, and he believes that the dog was attempting to self-medicate himself for the headache. So, if your pet starts acting very agitated, you may be in for some earth-shaking activity!
2. Sometimes... The Chinese claim to have predicted a earthquake using animals. It was in the early evening hours of February 4, 1975, when an earthquake of magnitude of 7.3 struck the densely populated town of Heicheng, in the Liaoning Province, in northeast China. As expected, because the magnitude was great and the area highly populated, damage to Haicheng and to neighboring towns was extensive. However, what was different about this earthquake is that very few lives were lost. The reason for the low death toll was that the occurrence of this earthquake had been successfully predicted. This prediction was based on a number of geophysical observations of precursor events as well as abnormal animal behavior. When the earthquake struck, the people of Haicheng and neighboring towns had been warned, and the warning saved many lives and averted a disaster of major proportions. Four other disastrous earthquakes were predicted by Chinese scientists during the 1975/76 period, giving hope that earthquake prediction was finally possible.
3. Of course some animals will act strangely. Some animals act strangely at random times. If one of those random times precedes an earthquake, people are likely to attribute the behavior to the animal's abilities to foresee the quake. This is nonsense. The only way to determine if an animal can foresee a quake is to watch it act strangely and record the time. Then you can check its accuracy. This way you can avoid confirmation bias.