VIDEO: Animals React to Their Mirror Images

Our pets often entertain us when they get face to face with mirrors, but have you ever wondered how wild animals would react? Well, this photographer has, so he set up a mirror and motion sensors to find out. Watch this awesome video capturing the animals’ bemusement or, in some cases, aggression.

Read all the details below, provided by USA Return.

Cats and dogs often pounce or bark at their reflection in a mirror, but what happens when larger, wild animals are put face-to-face with their reflection?

A photographer set up a mirror and motion sensors to find out and has released a hilarious video capturing their bemusement – and in some cases – aggression. It revealed that chimps will use the opportunity to preen themselves while leopards and gorillas will paw and charge at the familiar-looking ‘foe’.

A photographer set up a mirror and cameras in Gabon. He then filmed what happened when wild animals approached the mirror. Some, like a gorilla, couldn’t cope with seeing their own reflection and charged at it.

The experiment was performed by French photographer Xavier Hubert Brierre. He travelled to Gabon with his wife to set up a mirror in several locations and capture wild animals walking by. To capture the images, he hid cameras in security boxes and set up motion sensors that would trigger the cameras whenever some wildlife walked close to the mirrors. The results are fascinating, with one amusing reaction including a leopard trying to paw at the companion he can see.

In another a huge silverback gorilla stares at his reflection for a while, before charging at the mirror and attempting to confront what he thinks is another animal. An elephant is also seen having a brief look before serenely walking away. And groups of chimpanzees are seen spending time near the mirror, with some appearing to use it to preen themselves.

Despite the long days and attacks by various insects found in the African undergrowth, Mr Brierre said the experience was a thoroughly enjoyable one.

‘I had to wash the mirrors on which leopards and monkeys left greasy streaks, traces of blood and faeces left by insects hitting their surface ignoring their reflective property,’ he said. ‘Myself and my wife spent many long days at the site, often being attacked by different types of fly and bees.’

Interestingly, only a few animals like humans are able to recognise their own reflection, known as the mirror self-recognition test. Humans typically show self-recognition from an age of about 18 months. Most animals respond to seeing their own reflection with aggressive behaviour, but a small number of species – such as certain primates – can display human-like recognition.

One gorilla, a western lowland gorilla named Koko, showed signs of passing the mirror test in 1993, but western silverback gorillas like the one seen in Gabon typically get more aggressive.

The only bird ever to pass the mirror test, meanwhile, was a Eurasian magpie, which could see a sticker on its throat by itself and in a mirror.

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