If something about lemmings, it is probably about their tendency to mass suicide, truth? We've all heard stories of hundreds of thousands of lemmings, jumping off the cliffs, to die in the icy depths of the sea. Some people maintain, that the lemming bite is fatal and that these animals spread disease among humans. All these views are somewhat exaggerated.
First, lemmings can behave aggressively and belligerently, when they feel threatened or cornered. However, there is no evidence of this, that their bites are more dangerous than those of other rodents, or that lemmings have some special "gift” spreading diseases.
Regarding self-destructive behavior, common perceptions differ somewhat from reality. Lemmings are famous for periodic mass migrations, which take place every 5-20 years, when, after some extremely fertile reproductive period, their population becomes too numerous. Due to the increased number of animals, the vegetation becomes depleted and there is a shortage of food. Then large groups of lemmings descend from high altitudes in the usually vain hope of finding another, less crowded area and they die on the roads or in the maws of predators or even domestic animals. Correctness can be easily observed: for two years after the increase in the number of lemmings, there is also an increase in the number of predators, for example, foxes, buzzards and owls (in Poland, a similar phenomenon accompanies the so-called. "Mice year”, when our native rodents reproduce remarkably).
Quite often large groups of lemmings head towards the sea and indeed come to steep cliffs, because it is precisely the bluffs where most of the higher parts of the country end. When the rodents at the back of the groups begin to push forward, individuals at the head of the crowd, Whether you like it or not, they are trying to jump from the edge of the abyss. Also, bad weather when crossing fjords or lakes can cause massive drowning (however, you have to pay attention, that the more intelligent individuals do not go into the water at all). Neither of these situations is particularly pleasant for the lemmings, nor to an outside observer, but scientists do not confirm at all, that the motive for these behaviors was suicide.
Fortunately, lemmings survive in the higher parts of the country. More aggressive individuals, that remain in the mountains, to guard your territory, they are overgrown with fat and live happily. They wait under the snow for winter, and in the following year they multiply. Females already in 15. become pregnant on the day of their life. Most often they give birth to at least two litters of five pups each year, so the population is growing rapidly.