Some years ago, South Africa's game managers had to figure out what to do about the elephant herd at Kruger National Park. The herd was growing well beyond the ability of the park to sustain it. And so they decided to transport some of the herd to a nearby game park. 

A dozen years later, however, several of the young male elephants (now teenagers) that had been transported to the game park began attacking the park's herd of white rhinos, an endangered species. They used their trunks to throw sticks at the rhinos, chased them over long hours and great distances and stomped to death a tenth of the herd--all for no discernible reason. 

Park managers decided they had no choice but to kill some of the worst juvenile offenders. They had killed five of them when someone came up with another bright idea. They brought in some of the mature male elephants still residing in the Kruger Park and hoped that the bigger, stronger males could bring the adolescents under control.  To the delight of the park officials, it worked. The big bulls quickly established the natural hierarchy and reduced the violent behavior of the younger bulls. 

"The new discipline, it turned out, was not just a matter of size intimidation," says Raspberry. "The young bulls actually started following the Big Daddies around, yielding to their authority and learning from them proper elephant conduct. The assaults on the white rhinos ended abruptly." 

Raspberry's point was that young males--whether they are wild animals or human beings--need Dads.