What better way to survive being
cooped inside than with a little course study in Zombiology?
I think that we have covered how
zombies are dumb but relentless but we have also covered how zoms will not just
wander willy-nilly into a pool of burning gasoline. In that regard, they are
dumb but they are not stupid. They do seem to have a basic survival instinct.
Well, we can chalk up another category for zom traits: The path of least
resistance.
While we were on a run to look for
more buses, we headed out to some more rural areas to look for places that
could be easily looted. Having family out west of us, Judy drew us a map to get
us to Oklahoma Union that is located north of Nowata. Sure enough, the place
was abandoned. We looted the kitchen for all kinds of industrial sized cans of
food and then swiped the extra keys from the bus barn. A few of the buses
needed some coaxing to get started but we brought back a small convoy to
further expand our fence lines.
I noted something while traveling.
Humorist Will Rogers (from Claremore, by the way) commented about how land is
the only thing they are not making any more of. Oklahoma is fairly well known
for its wide open spaces and lots and lots of cattle pasture. I’ve mentioned
before how I had about 120 acres as my backyard.
Well, the one thing that cattle
farmers do not want is their cattle wandering out onto the highways. So
generally speaking, especially along the more isolated and less travelled highways,
the farm land on the other side of the ditches are fairly well fenced. Some
fences are clearly more expensive and better than others but these things are
designed to contain animals that way around 2,000 lbs. A single zombie, no
matter how relentless, is not going to force his way through a barbed wire
fence and remain intact.
I don’t want you to think of these
things as mindless robots that will just keep bumping over and over again into
a brick wall. We have yet to see a zom just mindlessly thrashing against a
fence unless there is actual bait on the other side of it. What we have yet to
see is just hordes of zombies impaled or hung up on barbed wire.
All this leads me to believe that zoms
take the path of least resistance when left to their own devices. I do truly
believe that they can be lured into traps. Now, granted, we are no in a
position to prove this theory but… I believe that if you were on two high rise
buildings with you on one building and zoms on the other and there was a small
enough gap between said buildings, zoms would plunge to their deaths trying to
get at you. They are that dumb. But they will not just struggle mindlessly
against a fence unless there is bait on the other side.
I am sure that with a large enough
horde, a fence could be plowed under with enough of them pressing against it
but so far, the hordes have stuck to the main roads and thoroughfares. Again,
it is opting for that path of least resistance. While you are preparing your
defenses, keep that in mind.
