What do you get when animals multiply?


My favorites are the Squiraffe and the Squorse — but all the ones that cross phylum boundaries are the best (notice that everything is a vertebrate but one? The most specialist, neatest one.).

Comments

  1. Sastra says

    I can’t help but wonder what the Creationists would make of this. Presumably, like the crocoduck, the absence of these species points to how evolution is a LIE.

    Unless they think we have been hiding these things somewhere. In which case evolutionists are EVIL.

    But they knew that.

  2. psweet says

    Umm… PZ,

    notice that everything is a vertebrate but one? The most specialist, neatest one.

    I assume you’re not talking about the arthropod?

  3. Azkyroth Drinked the Grammar Too :) says

    I9 is a shantak.

    Also, I can’t believe they missed the “elephino.”

  4. rq says

    Yes, those poor arthropods get forgotten every step of the way. :(
    But the batrus has a certain comic appeal, as does the lengthily named J10.
    The saddest thing is just sad. *big sad face*
    I’d love to meet a mooswhal, though. What a majestic picture that would be!

  5. astro says

    “something from a miyazaki film”

    oh, and i think “beagel” should have been spelled “beagle” which would certainly be an interesting result.

  6. naturalcynic says

    Also, I can’t believe they missed the “elephino.”

    Do you mean “elephino how they had sex”, or was it “elephino how the embryo developed”?

    I guess I will have to work on my vertebratism. I kept looking for the squirrel.

  7. woozy says

    I’m agreeing with the poster maker in naming the J10, the elephant-flamingo hybrid. And I also have seen Mt. Rushmore… by accident!

  8. naturalcynic says

    PZ could easily look for the moose and squirrel combination – it’s only a hop, skip and a jump to Frostbite Falls.

  9. nurnord says

    Are you KIDDING me ?!
    Not only has PZ not mentioned it in the original post, but 15 comments in and no one has either. How can we talk about weird hybrids without mentioning Ray Comfort, Kirk Cameron, crocducks etc. ?! Or creationists in general that make the claims that we evolutionists apparently are searching for…

  10. zadiginfinity says

    I really, really enjoyed this, but there’s one misspelling — E2 should be spelled ‘caterwhal’.

  11. nurnord says

    Pierce R. Butler @ #21
    You know, when I wrote that comment I was mindful of PZ missing the arthropod in the post and thought I had better check again my own observation. Laziness got me, I did not check again…thanks for increasing my misery :(

  12. jnorris says

    Now we know where the SCFI channel will get creature ideas for its next 50 movies. 200 movies if you add tornadoes.

  13. says

    Our cat is currently infatuated with a wild tom turkey who visits her every afternoon. I wonder what would happen if . . .

  14. says

    Per Avatar: The Last Airbender

    Katara: The King is throwing a party at the palace tonight for his pet bear.
    Aang: Don’t you mean platypus bear?
    Katara: No, it just says, ‘bear’.
    Sokka: Certainly you mean his pet skunk bear?
    Toph: Or his armadillo bear?
    Aang: Gopher bear?
    Katara: Just, ‘bear’.
    (short pause)
    Toph: This place is weird.

  15. Rick Pikul says

    Hawkat?

    They seriously didn’t realize that they had something like a ‘pygmy gryphon’?

  16. ledasmom says

    I would have liked to see a comparison between what results from an animal crossed with the “nice squid” and from the same animal crossed with the “mean squid”. Ditto for wild narwhal and house narwhal. Would have added to the scientific rigor.

  17. John Horstman says

    @John Britschgi #25: I <3 A:TLA! The Fortuneteller has a truly impressive deconstruction of religion as a mechanism for social control and group cohesion, using the application of scientific rationality in a magical universe (and calling out countless common logical fallacies)! Plus this beautiful exchange, which makes me suspicious John O’Bryan or Aaron Ehasz (credited writers for the episode) are familiar with terrible religious arguments. They also launch a scathing critique of the surveillance state in the Ba Sing Se episodes; “children’s” shows that don’t condescend to their audience are wonderful.

  18. ChasCPeterson says

    Why is the Ape represented by a Drill/Mandrill?

    Why is the Tortoise represented by a Kinosternid Mud Turtle?
    Why are the Hawk and the Eagle identical and both represented by a Pigeon with a tiny Crow’s Head?

    A: artistic License.

  19. Amphiox says

    Yes, those poor arthropods get forgotten every step of the way. :(

    That’s what you get for being too successful. When you’ve got more species than the entire rest of the clade combined, you kind of fade into the background in your ubiquity and everyone forgets about you….

  20. Rey Fox says

    Aww, a missed opportunity to cross horse with eagle and get gryphon.

    Hippogryph. And anyway, that’d be too easy.