I have to second Steve — this is an amazing blog, The Daily Coyote. A woman and a cat living in remote Wyoming have a friend, a young coyote.
This has got to be a frightening relationship. That’s a place where coyotes are shot on sight, with no remorse … maybe if a few more people read about Charlie, though, they won’t be so quick to kill.
Two big specialty science carnivals are up today: Circus of the Spineless #27
and
Encephalon #37. Take your pick, invertebrates or nervous systems…or read them both.
We had a seminar from Marco Restani of St Cloud State University yesterday — he’s a wildlife biologist who talked about Tasmanian Devils. Just a little tip: don’t ever invite wildlife biologists or conservation ecologists to give talks. They are the most depressing people in the world, and they really make it hard to hide away from the ugly realities. This talk was no exception: the Tasmanian Devil is in big trouble, and is facing at least two major threats, each of which may be sufficient to wipe them out. And just looke at that guy! He’s adorable! How can you let them go extinct?
Last August, when I was at the Sci Foo camp, Paul Sereno brought along the skull of one of his latest discoveries…and whoa, is it ever a weird one. This is Nigersaurus taqueti, an herbivorous dinosaur with specializations for ground-level grazing. Look at this picture; in reality, it’s even more striking.
Those jaws and teeth—they are so neatly squared off and flat-edged. In addition, the skull itself on the spinal column is turned habitually downward. This is a creature that kept its face pressed to the ground as it nibbled its way across the landscape.
Another feature that was apparent is that the skull is awesomely light — it’s mostly empty spaces with a delicate webwork of bony struts holding it together. It’s so specialized it’s almost comical, and you can imagine something like this appearing on the Flintstones as a lawn mower or hedge trimmer.
Bora has more, and you can read the original on PLoS.
Sereno PC, Wilson JA, Witmer LM, Whitlock JA, Maga A, et al. (2007) Structural Extremes in a Cretaceous Dinosaur. PLoS ONE 2(11): e1230. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0001230
I was sent this story of Russian workers in Chelyabinsk discovering a 5-foot long monster prehistoric fish that attacked them and that they had to kill with their equipment. Does this look like a horrible monster to you? Does it even look like a fish?
I’m off at this meeting and neglecting the site a bit, so when you’ve got little time and you want something cute to make everyone go “awww,” what do you do? Find a picture of a cuttlefish, of course.
If you are wondering who that little guy is on my shoulder, you need to be enlightened. Of course they’re beautiful. I keep a model right next to my spring-loaded squid toy.
So you want a closeup?
A friend of mine has a badger preoccupation. It was his expertise I consulted for last week’s blurb on badger culling. Between speaking with him and trying to plan a mad dash to Madison for its famous Halloween party, I’ve had badgers on the brain all week, so for this week’s post, I decided to couple “badger” and “neurobiology” in a literature search.
I found a delightful 2001 article on “Daily Activity Budgets of the Taiwan Ferret Badger (Melogale moschata subaurantiaca) in Captivity” by Kurtis Jai-Chyi Pei. It turns out ferret badgers spend most of their awake time traveling about followed by eating, drinking, playing and “staying alert.” But don’t give a ferret badger cause to think unfavorably upon you. The article goes on the describe how “…the noxious anal secretion is the most apparent weapon of the ferret badger.” This works best on mammals; apparently if you’re a bird of prey it isn’t so bad.
The point is… I want to be a ferret badger. Besides avoiding predation and competing for mates etc., it sounds like my kind of fun. We humans do too many activities that make us unhappy. I mean, what would a badger analysis of my activity budget look like?
Individual spends 33% sleeping, 15% eating/drink, 5% feigning disinterest in prospective mates, 5% time running in place, inordinate amount of time depleting natural resources, and somewhat less time complaining about the depletion of natural resources. For the remainder of active time, individual toils at some task or another the direct benefit of which is not apparent at this time. There is a curious lack of play exhibited– a behavior that has myriad benefits (Bandit and Thumper, 1996).
I think one of these days I’m going to relax and have myself a ferret badger day. If anyone nags me…POW. I’ll hit ’em with the noxious secretions.
