Animal of the Week September 22, 2014 -- World Rhino Day: a primer

White winos

After almost 10 years of Animal of the Week (admittedly often not weekly), it's a bit of a surprise to me that I have never featured a rhino. So in one fell swoop, I'll do the whole lot, in honour of world rhino day!

What is a rhino?
Rhinoceroses are represented by five species alive today. They are odd-toed ungulates (hoofed mammals). Their closest living relatives are the other odd-toed ungulates—horses and tapirs. More distantly they are related to the even-toed ungulates including cows, camels, hippos, and whales (yes whales, but that's another story).

African rhinos

Black rhinos

Two species, the white rhino (Ceratotherium simum) and black rhino (Diceros bicornis) are found in Africa. The largest of all rhinos, white rhinos are animals of grassland, with broad mouths designed for cropping grass at ground level (the 'white' in their names is a misinterpretation of the Afrikaans word for 'wide', in reference to their lips). The wide, square lip of white rhinos contrasts with the hooked lips of black rhinos designed for browsing shrubs, taller grasses, and low trees.

Indian rhino

Asian rhinos
Three species are found in Asia. The largest and most numerous Asian species is the Indian rhino (Rhinoceros unicornis), the smallest and hairiest of all the rhinos is the Sumatran rhino (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis), and the one in the middle, but the most endangered mammal species in the world is the Javan rhino (Rhinoceros sondaicus).






I thought rhinos were all extinct now

A Javan rhino (seen better days)

The northern subspecies of the white rhino, the west African species of the black rhino, continental representatives of the Javan rhino...all gone. There are about 15 000 white rhinos left in southern and eastern Africa. They outnumber representatives of all other species put together: about 5000 each of the black and Indian rhinos, and just a couple of hundred Sumatran rhinos. As few as 40 Javan rhinos remain on the western tip of Java...the last remnant of a species that once had a range extending from Pakistan, to China, to Java. All species experienced massive declines in recent centuries as firearms and transport meant that poachers could capitalise on the east Asian penchant for rhino-horn in traditional 'medicine'.

Horn, what is it good for?
Absolutely nothing. Rhino horn is made of the same stuff as fingernails and hair...so any claims of medical benefit are utter bunk. If rhino horn was good for you in anyway, you could achieve an equal benefit from chewing on your fingernails...so it's certainly not good for your nerves.

A matter of style
In The Lancet style guide, there is a picture of a Sumatran rhino with the instruction that it should always be referred to as the hairiest of all the rhinos on first mention...it's been there for a decade now...perhaps it's older than animal of the week.

 

Animal of the Week September 17, 2014 -- Scotland decides

NB: some of the tenses and phrasing in the following need thoughtful amendment.

Amid the ongoing debates about Scottish independence, one thing not many people seem to care much about is that come Friday morning, if a Yes vote for a new country is returned, the UK will lose its only endemic vertebrate species: Loxia scotica (Scottish crossbill). No other mammal, bird, reptile, or amphibian is found solely in the UK, and the Scottish crossbill is found only in the Caledonian forest, well north of the border.

Picture: RSPB.

As their name suggests, Scottish crossbills are Scottish and have crossed bills, in which the tips of the top and bottom curve to opposite sides. Crossbills use their peculiar beaks to extract seed from the cones conifers such as pines and larches. The red and the parrot crossbills can also be found in the UK (including England), but they are also found sur le continent.

Hard to distinguish from related species, the best way to tell the crossbills apart is by their call—it was the recognition of the distinct vocalisations of Scottish crossbills (a metallic jip) that confirmed them as a distinct species as recently as 2006.

So, it's not just the currency, taxation, health systems, national identity, etc affected by the #indyref #scotlanddecides referendum, it's also whether the UK loses its only endemic species. Not that I really care either way: as long as an independent Scotland looks after its crossbills, as it has done so far, I'm good.

Happy voting everyone. I hope it all works out well whatever you decide. x

Animal of the Week September 9, 2014 -- a whole new...

Well, maybe it's a phylum, but the people who have described this week's animal of the week, two species in the new genus Dendrogramma (in the new family Dendrogrammatidae), aren't so bold as to create such a high level taxon. But if the suspicion that these organisms are most closely related to species thought to have gone extinct 540 million years ago is borne out, we'll have to change how we think about the history of life on earth...a bit.

They do look like mushrooms. © 2014 Just et al

The two species were found during examination of specimens connected from the deep sea continental slope of Australia in 1986, but have only now just been described fully in a paper published in PLoS One. Superficially they look like mushrooms, but the specimens available show they have a skin and a gut separated by jelly like material.

Unfortunately the preparation of the specimens in pure strong alcohol means that genetic material no longer exists for phylogenetic analysis. Later drying out and preparation with pure alcohol led to shrinkage and more changes in the physical structure, hampering further investigations. More specimens will be needed to see where these organisms hang on the tree of life. (Fortunately, I've got a birth certificate so while I have been prepared in copious amounts of alcohol [and possibly formalin in my most desperate moments] my position on the tree of life is well established.)

The researchers note similarities with the Ediacaran (or Vendian) fauna, ancient extinct organisms known from some of the oldest fossils that were thought to represent failed early experiments in the animal kingdom. If these new species are related to those animals, our understanding that they all died out will have to be rethought.

On divisions of life
A phylum is a group of organisms with a basic body plan that are distinct from other phylums. For example, humans are joined in the phylum Chordata with fish, frogs, birds, dinosaurs and sea squirts, all because at some point in their lifecycle they possess a tail with notochord backbone. Discovery of new species is remarkable enough, genera pretty special, families thoroughly exciting and any higher level distinction incredibly rare in this day and age...but who knows what else is out there.

Mnemonic for recalling the divisions of life
King Philip can only find green socks
Kingdom (eg, animal), phylum (eg, chordates), class (eg, mammals), order (eg, carnivores), family (eg, cats), genus (eg, big cats), species (eg, tiger)

Animal of the week Sept 2, 2014 -- Geeeecccckkkkkoooooosssss iiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnn ssssssspppppppppaaaaaaaacccccccceeeeee

Luke J. Harmon - Harmon LJ—wikicommons

When Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, and he pondered his place in the universe, one question dominated his thoughts: I wonder if geckos could breed in zero gravity. This week's animal has been all over the news this past couple of days, because finally it looked like we might have the answer to Neil's question. It's Phelsuma ornata (Mauritius ornate day gecko).

These small brightly coloured geckos originate on the tropical Indian Ocean island of Mauritius, they scurry around the treetops by daytime hunting insects and avoiding predators in the tropical sunshine.

Five geckos were blasted into space on my birthday, July 15, aboard the Russian Foton-M Satellite as part of an experiment to investigate the great mystery of whether geckos are able to reproduce under zero-gravity conditions.

The satellite returned to earth in the small hours of Tuesday morning. Unfathomable excitement turned to crushing disappointment when the satellite was recovered and the geckos hadn't reproduced at all. In fact, all five had died. Died some time ago, as they had started to desiccate and mummify. It's possible that the lizard died of cold...average daily celcius temperatures in Mauritius are in the mid 20s...in space, it's colder.

What a loss to science.