Natural urge to play nurtures innovation

In 2008, my wife, Ellen, and I founded Safe Haven Farm Sanctuary in Poughquag. The sanctuary provides a permanent home to farm animals rescued from slaughter and abuse. We care for more than 100 animals, including sheep, goats, chickens, ducks, turkeys, and a mini-horse. I will tell you about a baby goat named Boomer, whose playfulness made a deep impression on me.

My story begins with Mattie, a mature female goat who was one of the first animals at our sanctuary. We purchased Mattie from a live meat market in the Bronx, where she was awaiting slaughter. When she set foot on the farm, she was extremely frightened, but after a few weeks she became more comfortable around humans and other animals.

Soon we noticed that Mattie was gaining weight more rapidly than would be expected. Stacy, a young woman who was our farm's caretaker, asked, "Could Mattie be pregnant?" We had our vet examine Mattie, but the vet couldn't tell. Then, after about three months, Mattie went into labor. Ellen, Stacy and I stayed with her during the night. Early the next morning, a baby started coming out. But the baby was turned the wrong way. Stacy took charge and turned the baby around. Then the baby, a boy, boomed out. Stacy named him Boomer.

Baby Boomer was full of energy. By 7 days old, he was sprinting back and forth in the aisle of the barn, apparently just for the fun of it. When he was 10 days old, he ran out to the pasture and tried to climb up a rock that was about 1 1/2 feet high. But just as he neared the top he slid down backwards, landing with a thud. He then climbed all the way up and jumped down — backwards — and this time landed perfectly.

Boomer climbed back up and jumped down several more times. He leapt forwards and backwards, and each time he added a new spin while in the air. He looked like a platform diver experimenting with new stunts. Seeing that I was observing him, Stacy said, "It's funny that he never just jumps, but always tries something new. He's full of antics."

All the while, Mattie looked on from a short distance, but she didn't intervene. According to the pioneering animal researcher Niko Tinbergen, this kind of unobtrusive watchfulness is typical of parents in many species. The parents constantly keep an eye on their young, but they act only when necessary.

Boomer's energetic play prompted me to read about play in other species. I learned that play is widespread in mammals, especially young mammals. It is found in young chimps, cats, dogs, wolves, sheep, rats — almost every mammal one can think of. Researchers such as Marc Bekoff and Jonathan Balcombe report that play also appears in many birds and fish.

Researchers also have speculated about the adaptive value of play — how it might help animals survive in the wild. A leading hypothesis, advanced by Bekoff and his co-authors, Marek Spinka and Ruth Newberry, is that play develops the capacity to improvise and therefore enables animals to handle unexpected events. If Boomer were to suddenly lose his footing on a hillside rock, or if he needed to jump to escape a predator, he wouldn't panic. During his childhood he became a master of improvisation. He would have a number of acrobatic moves at his disposal, and if need be, he could come up with a new maneuver.

Young human children, too, love to play, and they often experiment with new ways of moving around — hopping, skipping, marching, jumping, climbing, walking without making any noise, running fast downhill. Young children, of course, don't restrict their play to physical activities. They also engage in symbolic play, as when they use sticks to represent people and create imaginary scenarios. But much of their play, whatever its form, involves improvisation. Young children try out new ways of acting with their bodies and invent new make-believe dramas.

As with other species, the human capacity to improvise has contributed to human survival. Indeed, our species' ability to invent new tools and technologies has given us enormous power. We have harnessed the power of rivers, mined mountains and built great cities. True, our technological prowess hasn't been uniformly beneficial. Many of our technological and industrial developments have damaged the environment and other life forms. But this doesn't mean that our capacity to improvise — to create and imagine — should be abandoned. If we are ever to live in greater harmony with nature, we will need to imagine new possibilities.

One might think that our educational leaders would place a premium on childhood play, viewing it as the wellspring of human innovation. But this isn't the dominant view. Instead, education officials generally regard play as rather frivolous. As our schools increasingly emphasize early academics and test scores, play is shoved aside. Today, even kindergarten, once a playful introduction to school, is largely academic. Many schools also have further curtailed play by eliminating or reducing recess.

I believe this low regard for play is a serious mistake. As with other species, the human child's natural urge to play promotes a capacity for innovation that may prove vital in the years ahead.

William Crain is co-founder of Safe Haven Farm Sanctuary in Poughquag. Readers can learn more about the sanctuary from his most recent book, "The Emotional Lives of Animals and Children: Insights from a Farm Sanctuary." Also visit http://safehavenfarmsanctuary.org