Animal of the Week December 18/25, 2006 -- Deep breath, and all together everyone

On the first day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
A partridge in a pear tree.
(The word “fart” is derived from the Greek for partridge [Perdix perdix] “perdix”, partridges make a whirring noise when they fly)





On the second day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(Not called a turtle dove [Streptopelia turtur] because it has a shell, it doesn’t; the name comes from the soft cooing “turr turr” call)

On the third day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(Alsace, Aquitaine, maran, combattant du nord, coucou du Rennes, crevecouer, pictave, Lyonnaise… these are some French hens [Gallus gallus domesticus])

On the fourth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(Not “calling birds”, my friends, but “colly birds”, colly=coaly=black, yes, Blackbirds [Turdus merula], that what the true love gives 36 of in this song, enough for a pie and a half)


On the fifth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(Gold beetles [Plusiotus resplendens] are very gold but not ringshaped at all…. Clutching at straws my friends, clutching at straws)

On the sixth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(Domestic geese are derived from greylag geese [Anser anser], these geese frequently form same-sex pairs that engage in courtship behaviour and territorial disputes, up to 10% of pairs, these couples may act as guardians of the flock—gaylag geese more like)

On the seventh day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(Since the 12th century, all the mute swans [Cygnus olor] on the Thames have been owned by the British Monarch (these swans have no rings), except, that is, for those owned by the Dyers’ company (ringed on one leg) Vintners’ company (ringed on both legs))

On the eighth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(The most common dairy cow [Bos taurus] is the Holstein-Friesian; 9 million of the USA’s 10 million dairy herd are this breed. A single cow can produce 10 000 litres of milk a year in the USA where hormones are used to up milk production, but only 7000 to 8000 litres in the UK. Artificial insemination is the norm for dairy herds, meaning a few bulls can father entire generations of calves – the most prolific (200 000 calves) producer of bull-juice of all time was called… Starbuck)

On the ninth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Nine lady beetles,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(The theory goes that ladybirds are so-called after Our Blessed Lady, the mother of Jesus for their ability to save crops from pests!)

On the tenth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Ten Lord Howe woodhens,
Nine lady beetles,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(The restoration of the population of the Lord Howe woodhen [Gallirallus sylvestris] from 20 individuals in 1969 to 200 birds now by captive breeding and elimination of pigs from the small Island off the east coast of Australia is seen as a model for successful conservation)


On the eleventh day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me Eleven pipefish piping,
Ten Lord Howe woodhens,
Nine lady beetles,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
(In pipefish, such as the ornate ghost pipefish [Solenostomus paradoxus], as in their relatives seahorses, the male assumes the main parenting role, wither carrying the eggs around on specially adapted skin or in a pouch.)

On the twelfth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Twelve drummers drumming,
Eleven pipefish piping,
Ten Lord Howe woodhends,
Nine lady beetles
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden beetles,
Four colly birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree!
(Animal was the drummer for the Muppet band, Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem)

Partridge
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: The Partridge family 26
Top speed: 50 mph
Tenacity: 2
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 64%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 6
Violence: 2
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 24
Religiousity: 32
Special skill: Edibility 76

*James Blunt (né Blount), shooting accident?

Turtle doves
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Teenage mutant ninja turtles 12
Top speed: 40 mph
Tenacity: 2
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 12%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 7
Violence: 2
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 24
Religiousity: 24
Special skill: Cooing 62

*There is always hope

French hen
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Foghorn Leghorn 76
Top speed: 20 mph
Tenacity: 2
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 22%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 4
Violence: 2
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 31
Religiousity: 45
Special skill: Edibility 92

*Salmonella

Colly birds
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Cilla Black 3
Top speed: 25 mph
Tenacity: 2
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 3%
Aesthetically pleasing: 6
Violence: 2
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 2 (not pets, but they might visit!)
Religiousity: 21
Special skill: Birdsong 75

Golden beetle
Number of legs: 6
Celebrity a-like: Goldfrapp (Allison) 1
Top speed: 4 mph
Tenacity: 3
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 2%
Aesthetically pleasing: 7
Violence: 1
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 23
Religiousity: 47
Special skill: Being a golden 78


Greylag goose
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Anthony Edwards 21
Top speed: 50 mph
Tenacity: 4
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 2%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 6
Violence: 3
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 2
Religiousity: 18
Special skill: Roast potatoes 89 (see Nigella)

*As if Blunt is a member of the “Goose club” (see AOTW 04/12/06)

Mute swan
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Cate Blanchet (the most swanlike person I could think of) 15
Top speed: 50 mph
Tenacity: 4
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 76%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 8
Violence: 4
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 2
Religiousity: 58
Special skill: Breaking arms with a wing 67
*Break his arm with a wing, natch

Cow
Number of legs: 4
Celebrity a-like: Princess Di (it’s in the eyes) 33
Top speed: 30 mph
Tenacity: 3
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 46%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 5
Violence: 3
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 1
Religiousity: 80
Special skill: Kobe beef 89 (yumski)

*I persuade James Blunt to don a dog suit and tell the cow with the crumpled horn that James Blunt chased the cat that killed the rat that ate the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.

Ladybird
Number of legs: 6
Celebrity a-like: Spottyman from Superted 25
Top speed: 4 mph
Tenacity: 3
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 14%
Aesthetically pleasing: 7
Violence: 2
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 67
Religiousity: 8
Special skill: Eating aphids 72

Lord Howe woodhen
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Geoffrey Howe 12
Top speed: 18 mph
Tenacity: 2
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 12%
Aesthetically pleasing: 5
Violence: 1
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 16
Religiousity: 1
Special skill: Endemism 86

Ornate ghost pipefish
Number of legs: 0
Celebrity a-like: Michael Fish 1
Top speed: 2 mph
Tenacity: 2
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 10%
Aesthetically pleasing: 8
Violence: 1
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 2
Religiousity: 2
Special skill: Looking like coral 78

Animal
Number of legs: 2
Celebrity a-like: Animal 100
Top speed: 14 mph
Tenacity: 5
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 67%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 3
Violence: 6
Can be kept on a roof terrace: 50
Religiousity: 18
Special skill: Drumming 69

*Drumstick in the eye, biting, that sort of thing, especially if Blunt tries to sing

Animal of the Week December 11, 2006 -- Top trumps start here

Well, 11 doors (okay okay, 12) open on the advent calendar, and what was it today...

Little Equus asinus (donkey), little donkey on the dusty road
Got to keep on plodding onwards with your precious load
Been a long time, little donkey, through the winter’s night
Don’t give up now, little donkey, Bethlehem’s in sight
Ring out those bells tonight
Bethlehem, Bethlehem
Follow that star tonight
Bethlehem, Bethlehem
Little donkey, little donkey had a heavy day
Little donkey, carry Mary safely on her way

You may be surprised that I have not plumped for one of those deep-sea species all over the news like a bad case of crabs this week... well, they're just not festive enough. But following on from one red-top paper's lead of giving the deep-sea organisms a tenacity score for their ability to hang on to life at the margins of possibility. Here is the first AOTW top trump card! A series that you and your friends can cut out and keep (I'm sensing the must-have gift X mas 2007 here).

Donkey
Number of legs: 4
Celebrity a-like: Alanis Morissette 78
Top speed: 35 mph
Tenacity: 4
Likelihood of hurting James Blunt: 86%*
Aesthetically pleasing: 4
Violence: 4
Can be kept on a roof terrace: (miniature donkeys) 3
Religiousity: Popular in monotheistic religions and Seth of the ancient Egyptian pantheon had a Donkey's head 65
Special skill: Burden 68

*Aroused by the braying sound of Blunt's voice, donkey uses one of his more famous attributes (frequently used in a popular simile [yeah, that's right kids, "kick like a donkey"]) to ensure that Blunt won't be thinking about sitting down at a piano to write songs for a while.

The origins of the word donkey are unknown, but it became widely used only in the 18th century. Perhaps because at that time, pronunciation of the word ass matched that of the word "arse", so the historically more popular word fell out of use to save blushes. Later, pronunciation of ass changed back to the way we know it today, but in American English 'arse' was lost all together and ass became the word for deriere. Donkey might be a diminutive form of the word "dun" (a common donkey colour) and originally pronounced to rhyme with "monkey".

Donkeys feature commonly in the bible, and in many stories mentioning that a man was riding a donkey was to imply wealth, as they were the biblical equivalent of sports cars. Maybe if Joseph and Mary actually had a sports car they'd have got a proper room. The young chap in this week's picture is certainly pleased as punch to own the nippy little model at his side. A miniature donkey!

Computer-game star Donkey Kong was not, in fact, a donkey but earns the moniker due to his stubbornness.

Next Week... Christmas!

Cheers All,

Animal of the Week December 04, 2006 -- Tis the season.... to be eaten

And what was on the door of Animal of the Week's advent calendar this morning?

Maleagris gallopavo (turkey). Over 45 million turkeys will have been eaten over Thanksgiving in the US, then just a few weeks later another 22 million will be eaten in US at Christmas, in the UK we’ll get through another 11 million or so… these are tough times for this week's animal.

The popularity of turkey at Christmas and Thanksgiving is actuality a recent addition to harvest and midwinter traditions. The only foodstuffs documented at the Plymouth pilgrims' feast with the Wampanoag in 1621 were venison and waterfowl, Queen Elizabeth favoured goose at Harvest Festival, Americans probably later switched to turkey as they were more abundant. Until the middle of the 1900s turkey was something of a luxury in the UK. In Dickens' A Christmas Carol, when Scrooge has had some festive goodwill spooked into him, he saves the Cratchits from the "goose club" by purchasing a prized turkey for them.

Intensive farming and the development of new double-breasted breeds (large and well-dressed) has made turkeys a popular choice for large family gatherings. Male turkeys, called gobblers or toms, naturally woo females, or hens, by displaying with their bright blue snood (the extendable protrusion above their beak) and wattle, a fanned tail, and elaborate gobbling. Many industrially farmed turkeys cannot mate of their own accord (the toms are lucky if they can walk, let alone gobble) and so the females have to be artificially inseminated. That is, unless they manage to reproduce without mating, as turkeys are want to do. Traditional breeds of turkey resemble more closely their wild North American forebears and are able to breed naturally, walk, run, and fly. They also taste nicer and require less farm trickery to raise them.

Surprisingly nippy, wild turkeys can fly well and can run at speeds of up to 55 miles per hour! They need to. In the southern USA, fried turkey is a popular dish, and a Turkeyfryer has been developed in which a whole bird can be deep fried, I was amused but not surprised to find out about this.

This is turning into a bit of an essay, but I couldn't finish without pondering why an American bird is called turkey. There are several theories about its origins: it's a corruption of the native word, firkee; it's derived from turka, the Indian (Asian sub-continent) name for peacock, the Americas were originally thought to be attached to India; it comes from a tendency for English speakers to name exotic things after exotic places; or perhaps most likely, it was originally thought to be related to the African helmeted guinea fowl (Numida meleagris), which was called a Turkey-cock as it was imported to Europe through Turkey, and so the turkey was also called a Turkey-cock. The name stuck in North America, but when the guinea fowl's origins were better understood, they were renamed. Convoluted I know, but I like it that way.

Animal of the Week November 20, 2006 -- Don't step on my blue suede flippers

Hello Ani-freaks

Sometimes, I'd just like to leave you with a picture. And ideally this would be one of those weeks. But then regular readers know that I don't know when to leave well-enough alone.

This week's animal is Eudyptula minor (fairy penguin, little penguin, little blue penguin, or Kororā). The smallest species of penguin is a resident of New Zealand and southern Australia. Rescued fairy penguins in the Antarctic Center in Christchurch, New Zealand, have been spending too much time hanging out on the shingle flexing their wings, rather than swimming in their pool. Their idle posing has led to calluses on their feet, and these natty little daps have been developed along with a regimen of saltwater footbaths to cure their foot injuries in preparation for their return to the wild.

Unendangered, widespread, and a popular tourist attraction, the fairy penguin is one of the luckier animals featured in animal of the week. However, one threat to the fairy penguin is that of rebranding. In April this year, staff at Sea World, Queensland, Australia, were planning to rename fairy penguins as they felt the name might offend gay men... or fairies as they are clearly more popularly known.

Anyway, wouldn't bother this one, look how chuffed it is with its new shoes. Definitely a female.

Cheers all,

Animal of the Week November 13, 2006 -- The witchetty grub eats the witchetty shrub

Take the phone off the hook, put down your copy of War and Peace, cancel all appointments you may have for the next few weeks. For, thank the lord, I’m a Celebrity Get Me out of Here is back! Sorry non-UKers, you won’t be able to watch this marvel of televisual entertainment in which ten of our top media figures battle with the elements and the insects with the aim of being crowned king or queen of the jungle. If they succeed they will join such cultural behemoths as Kerry Katona and Joe Pasquale (do you know how hard I find it not to use Pesci instead of Pasquale – now that would be worth watching) on the fast train to Iceland! If they fail, well, it’s a short trip back to obscurity (unfortunately they do come back).

No doubt, at some point over the next few weeks, a squealing nobody will bravely chow down on one of this week’s animals in a bushtuckertrial. For this week’s animal is Xyleutes leucomochla, (cossid moth, witchetty grub). These native Australian delicacies are actually the larvae of any one of several beetle or moth species, but most commonly they’re cossid moth larvae.

Witchetty grubs rather poetically feed on the roots of witchetty shrubs. They grow fat on the sap, storing up energy for a fleeting life as an adult. The moths are the size of sparrows, and the grubs may be 7 cm long and as fat as your finger (if you’ve got fat fingers like me).

Eaten raw they provide tasty snacks with leathery skin, sweet flesh, and a liquid centre (like liqueur chocolates in a sausage skin). If you prefer, you can, in true Australian style, throw them on the barbie—after such treatment they will taste like chicken (of course – what doesn’t?) or prawns with peanut butter. To people survivining in the outback, these larvae can be a lifeline, for TV producers, they're another titilating, humiliating stunt!

So who will end up eating the witchetty grubs? Will it be 1980s newsreader Jan Leaming, Tony Blair’s sister in law Lauren Booth, ex-Joseph Jason Donovan, ex-Footballer’s wife Phina Oruche, or ex-Mr Minelli and current Mr Potato Head David Guest? You’ll just have to watch to find out.

At least we know it won’t be flamboyant designer, Scott Henshall (no me neither), who has said that he will not eat any creepy crawlies; so no doubt the producers will be feeding him the testicles this time – which was probably, after having seen a snippet of him on the show, his thinking all along.

Oh, and this week's picture, there is a witchetty grub in his hand, and well, it's only a matter of time before one of them is on IACGMOOH, right?

I thank you,

Animal of the Week November 6, 2006 -- Roll up, roll up, see the freakshow dolphin

In honour of the forefinned and hindfinned, four-finned specimen caught off the coast of Japan this week, animal of the week is somewhat predictably Tursiops truncatus (bottlenose dolphin).

Bottlenoses are some of the largest dolphins and have a worldwide distribution in tropical and temperate waters. They are the typical dolphinarium dolphin, splashing spectators and firing their keepers out of the water for our entertainment in many a water park. But, as you may well have seen for yourself, they generally have only the paired pectoral fins and a dorsal fin.

So, why the bejesus does this Japanese one have four paired fins? Is it part of this highly intelligent species' plan for world domination? Will they be freeing up their forelimbs for the use of weapons of the modern age such as guns, knitting needles, or paparazzo cameras? Can we expect to see a beaky crusader creeping up the street with its sights on our pints any time soon?

Unlikely.* Fortunately for the future of the human race, this aberration is probably caused by the accidental switching on of an ancient gene that did once lead to the development of hind limbs. Believe it or not, dolphins, whales, and porpoises belong to the same group of animals as cows, giraffes, and camels -- the artiodactyls or even-toed ungulates. The closest living relatives of whales and dolphins are hippos; and rather surprisingly, cows, sheep, deer, and giraffes are more closely related to whales and hippos than they are to camels. Some innovative hippo-ish creature took the extra four-legged steps into the ocean about 50 million years ago. The whales and dolphins never looked back, becoming supreme marine mammals and streamlining by losing their hind limbs.

Atavistic features, such as this dolphin's hindfins, are not common, but nor are they unheard of: dolphins and whales with pelvic fins have been found before; and Alexander the Great's horse, Bucephalus, was said to have had additional toes with hooves resembling those of the ancestral horse merychippus. Do human's show atavistic traits, I hear you ask? Well, anyone unfortunate enough to have seen my back in my recent and advancing years will have witnessed, firsthand, evidence of our furry origins.

I thank you,

Peter Hayward
Head Keeper
Animal of the Week

*Just in case any of you sly bastards are reading this, you can keep your fins off my beer, alright.

Animal of the Week -- October 23, 2006 -- See a bird in another bird's mouth

Well, it's sawhain again, time to cut up some fishnet stockings, pile on the face paint, perfect walking around your house with the lights off to fool the trick-or-treaters into thinking there's no-one at home, and get a pumpkin ready to drive off the malevolent forces that will try to possess you this Tuesday night.

For many a Londoner, the most despicable creature, surely an instrument of the devil and harbinger of ill is the pigeon. Not that we hate pigeons per se (naturally I don't, I love all the animals), but the abundance, omnipresence, and pestilence of these "rats with wings" is a constant reminder of all that is ill with society. There are a few crazies, probably in cahoots with the dark lord, who think that feeding the toeless, tumour-ridden aves will, in some way, help them. It won't, it will just enable them to breed more quickly and so increase the number of sick birds spluttering, stumbling, and dripping on our polluted city streets. Feed them less, they'll breed less, and a smaller population of birds will be healthier and cleaner.

Anyway, last week, the arrival of an unlikely champion in the battle against the number of pigeons (note, not against the birds themselves) appeared: Pelecanus onocrotalus (eastern white pelican, great white pelican). One of the four eastern white pelicans that inhabit Duck Island in the park's lake was photographed snaffling a pigeon. The pelican held its victim in its beak for about 20 minutes before managing to get the pigeon facing head first for the trip to the pelican's belly. Although pelicans are much better known for their consumption of fish, the head first principle of swallowing scaly finny fish also applies to feathery wingy birds.

Now, there have been great hopes for the return of the peregrine falcon to London, and its role in reducing the numbers of pigeons, but I have seen a peregrine make a kill in London, and what did it kill? It killed an ickle starling. Rubbish, let's get in more pelicans.

There have been pelicans in St James' Park since the Russian ambassador gave some as a gift to Charles II in 1664. In less prescriptive times when the birds' wings weren't clipped, one used to nip up to the Regents Park zoo and steal the fish at feeding time. The flaps of skin from pelicans' bills have been used as tobacco pouches and, even more inventively, as sheaths. Fish, baccy, pigeons, members, and spent semen -- truly, a peculiar bird is a pelican, its beak can hold more than its belly can.

Peter Hayward
Head Keeper
Animal of the Week

Animal of the Week -- October 23, 2006

Guess who?! That’s right, it’s me! Hiya!

Just a heads up, you have only a few minutes left to buy your Iceland Air all inclusive tickets for the Sugarcubes’ gig in Reykjavik on November 17, 2006—yes, Bjork will be with them (http://www.icelandair.co.uk/home/packages/our-best-deals/detail/store65/item52342/?gclid=CKLMs-PKjYgCFRtNEgodoFROHQ). Of course if you are a fan of this week’s animal of the week, you might think twice about going to Iceland . This week’s animal of the week is the second biggest animal in the whole wide world Balaenoptera physalus (fin or finback whale), that goes in and out of the harbour.

Although it is the fastest species of whale, reaching speeds of 37 km per hour, one hapless individual was not able to outpace the Icelandic whaling boat that was the first to head out on Iceland ’s resurrected commercial whaling enterprise. The 20 m whale was harpooned in the north Atlantic. I said "Ouch! this really hurts".

Iceland, along with Norway, has decided to resume commercial whaling and will take nine fin whales and 30 minke whales between now and next August, even though the International Whaling Commission still bans the killing whales for non-research purposes. Japan continues to capture whales for scientific research. I will shortly be conducting my own scientific research on an egg sandwich. I’ve got to eat something otherwise I’ll die.

Most estimates put the northern hemisphere population of fin whales at about 5000 and the southern hemisphere population at about 1000 and the species is classified as endangered by the Intenational Union for the Conservation of Nature. Icelandic authorities reckon there are may be as many as 20 000. Quantifying the numbers of ocean animals isn’t the easiest thing, but there may not be plenty more whale in the sea. Fin whales grow to 25 m long and maybe 70 000 kg, they dine on tiny krill (very small shrimp-like animals). Indeed, they don’t really like lobster (like lobster).

Of course if you do find yourself in Iceland and you pass a butcher, you may like to make a purchase, and you'll need to know what to do with it:

Joint of Whale Meat Steeped in Red Wine Marinade
6–8 portions:
1 1/4 kg of whale meat
3 dL red wine
1 dL vegetable oil
3 ground cloves
1/2 tsp coarsly ground pepper
2 tsp of salt
The Marinade
3/4 L juices from the meat
Thickening (milk and flour)
4 dessert spoonfuls of sour cream
Sugar
Salt
It may be a good idea to bind the joint to help it keep in good shape. Place it in a small oven dish and pour the marinade over. Leave the joint there until the next day, turning it at regular intervals. Remove the joint from the dish, dry it well and rub it with salt. Cook the joint until it turns a pleasant brown colour all over, turn down the heat, and add water to reach 2–3 cm up the side of the joint, approx. 3/4 L. Let the joint simmer for about 20 min, turn it over and leave it for another 20 min. Measure enough of the juices to make enough marinade, about 3/4 L. Add the thickening to the marinade, and then the sour cream to taste. Serve with boiled beans or other vegetables, and boiled or fried in the pan.

Ahhh, it’s good to be back.

Ta

Peter Hayward
Head Keeper
Animal of the Week

Animal of the Week September 18, 2006 -- The great white hope

Hello Ani-freaks

Those among you who know me well know that when Sleater Kinney ( US , post-riot-grrl, bassless, les-rock trio) does something, I tend to follow. So when they announced earlier this year they'd be on indefinite hiatus, I saw the future of Animal of the Week. But whereas their's is an indefinite hiatus of probably forever, mine is an indefinite hiatus of 2, 3, maybe 4 weeks, just while I realign my life. So, don't consider this my farewell tour...more of an "au revoir mailout".

And just as this onset of the inter-regnum of AOTW will likely be recorded as a legendary event in the history books, so this week's animal of the week marks a remarkable occurrence, a good omen for all the nations of the world. For this week's Animal is the male white bison born a few weeks back on the Heiders' farm in Wisconsin, USA. In several First Nations religions, typically those of plains tribes, white bison are sacred and considered to have mystical, magical, and healing properties. Lakota Sioux legend has it that PtsanWi (White Buffalo Calf Woman) appeared to two scouts sent to look for food in a time of famine, although she seemed to be a beautiful young woman clad in white, she was really a white buffalo in disguise. One scout tried to embrace her, she turned him into a pile of bones, the other tried to shoot her, but she told him "Don't even bovver me wiv your arrows, I'm a god innit", and then she went and helped out the tribe, gave them some scran, smoked a peace pipe, and taught them music and rituals. Which just goes to show that it's better to threaten a god than to get amorous with one. In another legend, a male white buffalo will be born that will reunite all the nations of the world, turning from white, to red, to yellow, to black, and to brown representing the races of people. Seems like this bull calf is right on time, eh?

This is the third white bison to be born on the Heiders' farm since 1994; the meaning of this birth for many people is quite profound. For cynics, it is a sign that the Heiders' bison have interbred with European cattle.

The American bison (Bison bison) was once the most numerous large mammal species in the world, there were about 100 million of them roaming the prairies and forests of North America in the middle of the 19th century. However, they became an enemy of "progress" for the USA, not only could the massive herds obstruct construction of railways and hold up trains for weeks, but also the Native Americans—who relied on the bison for clothing, food, tools, and housing—could be killed, weakened, and dispossessed by eradicating the bison. At the height of the slaughter (right year, right season), European American hunters may have been killing as many as 100 000 animals per day. Don’t believe me? Check out the pile-of-skulls picture! “ Buffalo ” Bill Cody was said to have killed 100 animals in one session, and one hunter claimed that in his years as a professional he had shot 20 000 bison. By 1890, there were just 200 or so animals—that's 99 999 800 animals killed in about 50 years! Presently there are about 350 000 bison. Only a few hundred purebred animals exist, and the only continuously wild population of purebred bison lives in Yellowstone Park . Between 1978 and 1992, bison caused more injuries or deaths than bears did in Yellowstone (56 vs 12), rates of pickernick-basket theft are not reported.

Since the birth of the third white calf on the Heiders' farm, Native Americans have been making donations of tobacco and dream catchers at the Heiders' farm and have been holding drumming vigils to honour the auspicious arrival. Bunch of tree-huggers! Visit Heiders' farm shop for all your cigarette and dream catcher needs.

Animal of the Week September 11, 2006 -- Blessed are the cheese mites

"Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!"

Sorry, have been working like a llama on coca for the past three days and just not had... ach, you don't want my excuses, you just want Tyrophagus casei (cheese mites).

Well you may not actually want them, they can cause contact dermatitis (affectionately referred to grocer's itch) and ruin your double Gloucester. These tiny arachnids reach no more than 0.7 mm long, and can be found all over your groceries, in damp flour, and even in honeycomb, but they have a particular affection for cheese. Several grocery mites live in a variety of environments, flour mites can be found (quite literally) all over the shop, and prune mites (I kid you not) are also partial to life in other dried fruits and jam. I want to live in jam, I really do...

Although they can cause food spoilage and a mild allergic reaction, cheese mites do have their uses. In Saxony-Anhalt (central Germany) there is an ancient tradition of making Spinnenkäse, also known as spider cheese, or more correctly Milbenkäse, mite cheese. Raw curd is salted and flavoured with caraway seeds (mmmm minty), rolled into balls, and put in a box full of mites. The mites burrow into the cheese, and their various waste leads to fermentation which imparts a piquant, bitter flavour. The cheese is eaten either early when yellow, later when reddish brown, or by the brave when black (completely coated in a layer of dust, made up of mites, their skin, and their faeces). Altenburger is another cheese made with mites (or possibly the same cheese, my German is not so good).

Cheese mites featured in at least two poems by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, here is one, sadly not called The Adventure of The Dusty Cheese:
A Parable
The cheese-mites asked how the cheese got there, And warmly debated the matter;The Orthodox said that it came from the air, And the Heretics said from the platter.They argued it long and they argued it strong, And I hear they are arguing now;But of all the choice spirits who lived in the cheese, Not one of them thought of a cow.
I always feel guilty when I'm late with an animal, so next week's will also be late to give the cheese mites a fair shot. And next week's, animal will have an as yet undetermined tenure while I take a break to reorganise my life—more on that then. Must dash, the King and Queen of Hearts will be wondering where I've got to.

Animal of the Week September 04, 2006 -- RIP Steve Irwin

RIP Steve Irwin,

I heard the news as the half-light of dawn crept around the the edges of my curtains, with sleep still gooing up the corners of my tired little eyes, I couldn't quite believe it, but it's true. Steve Irwin, all-round Australian, crocodile harasser, and conservationist has been killed by a stingray sting to the chest. Although I prefer a less intrusive tv presenter to show me animals, as a populariser of conservation issues and advocate for maligned reptiles, Irwin was hugely successful and popular.

As a mark of respect, this week's animal of the week is Dasyatis brevicaudata (smooth stingray, bull ray, short-tail stingray), reportedly the species that did for big Steve. There are about 70 species of stingray, some living in freshwater in Asia, Africa, and South America, but most living in marine environments. The smooth stingray is the largest marine species reaching 430 cm in length and weighing up to 350 kg.

All rays are, like sharks, cartilaginous fish; but unlike sharks, because their eyes are on the top of the body and the mouth on the bottom, they never see what they eat, rather they use smell and electro reception to locate prey beneath them. Most eat molluscs, crustaceans, and small fish. The spine is used in defence and the raising of the tail is an automatic reflex to a threat or attack, there is no intent to harm.

Stingrays have one or more razor-sharp spines on their tails, in large species the spines can reach over 180 mm in length. These barbs are coated with fierce toxins that cause substantial pain. Generally stingrays are not aggressive and avoid confrontation, it is very rare for people to be stung, usually this only happens if someone treads on a concealed fish, typically a resulting sting to the leg will be uncomfortable for a couple of days, but rarely fatal. In very rare cases, as in Irwin's, a sting to the heart or chest can puncture a vital organ or cause severe toxicity sufficient to kill.

The producer of the show he was filming at the time of the incident says that, if Steve were here, he would say, simply "Crocs rule!". A bit of a downbeat topic today. But he died doing what he was best known for and something he loved. So big respect to Steve and his family and friends.

Animal of the Week August 28, 2006 -- The most gruesome parasite?

Ahhh, a Bank Holiday trip to the seaside. Delightful seafood served fresh from the ocean. Yum yum yum. "What's your favouorite fish?" I asked my friends as I ploughed through a selection of fried seafood, they'd say "Oh I don't really know". I'd say, "I really like hake, it's delicious, the Spanish have a way with it."

I also really like red snapper, as, it turns out, does this week's animal of the week Cymothoa exigua.

In perhaps the most disturbing act of parasitism I have ever heard of (maybe tied with that catfish), this isopod crustacean (an aquatic woodlouse) latches on to the tongue of a red snapper and taps into the blood supply. As the parasite grows, the fish's tongue wastes away. Eventually, the snapper's tongue withers completely, by this point the parasite has switched from living off the blood supply to nicking some of the food the fish catches. But don't feel too upset for the fish, it can carry on just fine because by now the fish is using C exigua as its tongue instead. Obviously it would be better for the fish if it didn't have to share its supper with the crustacean, but they can continue to grow, remain healthy, and sometimes even make it into fishmongers. Although this bizarre relationship is only known from the Gulf of California, last year, one unlucky customer in London bought a red snapper only to discover when he got it home that it had a marine woodlouse for a tongue. I'd just get your fishmonger to take off the head and never even think about it.

Animal of the Week August 21, 2006 -- The Androscoggin Beast

Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves
And the mome raths outgrabe

Headlights chase the darkness down a forest lined New England highway. No other cars on the road, only the short tunnel of light specked with drops of luminescent drizzle. Something shoots across the tarmac on the edge of the light, running so fast that the young couple in the car can barely make out that it's a raccoon. Wwwwwmmmmmmmmmffffff, Dffff
"Oh my god, what was that?" shrieked the young man in the passenger seat.
"Just a deer or something"
"Stop the car"
The young woman braked and pulled over to the side of the road and reversed back to where they had hit something else running out of the forest. Steam rises from the body, swirling in the livid glow of the taillights. The car stops and the couple get out. Cautiously they approach the lifeless heap of grey fur.
"Jeez man, that sure don't smell like any deer I've ever come across."
By morning, the small towns of Litchfield and Greene are buzzing with news, rumour, and exaggeration: "They hit it!", "They got the beast", "The car was totalled", "100 pounds with three inch fangs", "A bears hind leg in its jaws". The legendary beast of Androscoggin County—scourge of a handful of small Maine towns, savager of rottweilers, red-eyed hellmonster—was dead, killed by chance.
Over the next few days the stories became as tall as the poplars in the forest—a dingo, a hyena, part gerbil part wolf, part dog part bear, part gorilla part chicken. Few had actually been to look at the beast's body before it was picked clean by the turkey vultures and the bones dispersed by foxes. But people had seen it before—fleeting glimpses in their gardens, a head shoved through a garden hedge after a terrified cat, quickly withdrawn on sight of a human being. Its short muzzle, demonic eyes, and drool-smattered fangs were part of the collective consciousness of Androscoggin.
As news spread, the interest of local cryptozoologist (a researcher into mythical or legendary animals) Loren Coleman (in the movie, played by Jeff Goldblum—natch) was piqued. A few photographs were taken, but no other evidence of the body remains. Trying to gather as much information about the victim of the road accident, Coleman ascertained that the creature was about 40 lb (hardly a monster), charcoal-grey in colour, and in possession of short triangular ears, a bushy tail, and a short muzzle. The zany scientist recalled a previous case of a similar beast shot by a hunter elsewhere in New England, investigators had hoped to prove the existence of werewolves or at least a new species of predatory mammal, but DNA analysis had shown the mystery creature to be a wolf–dog hybrid. Bolstered by Coleman’s backing the authorities sent word out that even he, a professional chaser of non-existent chimeras, believed the animal to be nothing more than a feral mongrel, or, at most, a hybrid of a dog and coyote. Oh… what an anticlimax! Thus ends the near fact.

“And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
He chortled in his joy.

Of course, in the movie version, that’s just the beginning, the townspeople return to their quiet everyday lives, rather embarrassed about having got so worked up about a stray dog. Here we cut to some government bunker where a crazed scientist (Tommy Lee Jones) splices together genes from bears, wolves, chupacabras, and emus to create a mega-army of beasts with which to wage war on the just people of New England. Nothing stands between him and world domination but the determination of a seemingly mad old woman (Lilly Tomlin) who knows what is really going on, and who, with the help of eye-candy grand-daughter and her love interest (Lindsay Lohan and Jesse Metcalf), manages to reawaken the scepticism of Jeff Goldblum by supplying him with a curious sample of fur from the beast that killed her husband. And what do the babies of the monsters that Tommy is creating look like, you guessed it, the critter killed in the opening scene—it was just a pup.

Animal of the Week August 14, 2006 -- Kimberella

As I got distracted from my aim to balance out the phyla last week by the woolly-hairy madness of the geep, this week's animal is as contrary to my mammalian favouritism as I can get. Introducing.... Kimberella!

Although it sounds like the lead character in an animated modernisation of the Cinderella fairytale, it's actually one of the earliest animals known in all the whole wide world, ever ever ever. Kimberella is a Vendobiont, one of the lifeforms that lived before the groups of modern animals lived (not be confused with a Vengaboy, one of the lifeforms that proves evolution is a random process not overseen by any guiding force—or at least not an omnicognisant one). The vendobionts lived during the Ediacaran age (635–542 million years ago). Kimberella is in no way the oldest known vendobiont, but for many of the others, whether they are plants or animals, algae, fungi, or something else entirely is a matter of debate.

Before 635 million years ago, the world was just a great big snowball. In springtime 634 million years ago, the ice began to thaw and over the next 80 million years diverse forms of soft-bodied life appeared. Whether any of the forms that evolved in this period have descendants alive today is unclear. Some of the fossils bear similarities to jellyfish and starfish, but their associations remain doubtful. Kimberella is itself supposed by some to be mollusc, a limpet without a shell perhaps. It certainly seemed to have bilateral symmetry, and mollusc like trails thought to have been left by Kimberella have been found in some rocks from this period.

At the end of the Ediacaran period, the vendobionts vanished...At the end of 2002, the Vengaboys seemed to have vanished too. However, I have just learned (my research for AOTW covers all bases) that there was a reunion gig at the Astoria in London on July 15 this year! Coincidence that they should reform on my birthday? I bloody-well hope so.

So there you have it, perhaps the most ancient animal that will ever be animal of the week!

Ta

PS, if anyone knows any cheapish accomodation with good access (bus, bike, walk, tube) to South Kensington in London that will be available from mid-September, give me a shout. I am easy going and quite presentable, independent, considerate, a generous and able cook, and versed in the changing of lightbulbs (bayonet and screw fitting).

PPS, apologies for overuse of pop culture references. Next week, I promise, no mention of camp pop, television I have watched, or eighties US teen comedy series.

Animal of the Week August 07, 2006 -- Geep

So, I recently finished uploading all the available Animal of the Weeks onto the blog (http://animal-of-the-week.blogspot.com/), and do you know what I noticed? Most AOTWs have been vertebrates (fish, birds, mammals, and the like); among the vertebrates, mammals are vastly overrepresented. Indeed, last week's animal was the first time that a genus has been repeated, and what was it? Yeah, a primate (http://animal-of-the-week.blogspot.com/2006_07_01_animal-of-the-week_archive.html, http://animal-of-the-week.blogspot.com/2004_12_01_animal-of-the-week_archive.html). Classism, maybe... and I had never really thought of myself as being prejudiced.

So today I was going to start at the bottom, and over the next few weeks intersperse some of the more basal animals groups with the regular role-call of bird muderousness, new monkeys, and seafood recipes. So, there I was, reading about sponges in preparation—the least animal-like of all the animals, sponges are a sister group to all other animals. Sponges are simple animals with no distinct tissues, although they do have functionally differentiated cells. I have known for many years that if you put a sponge in a blender, surviving cells will reform a complete and living sponge. But here is where I got distracted by the wikipedia entry: "If multiple sponges are blended together, each species will recombine independently (contrast animal chimera such as the geep)". Now, a chimera is an animal comprising cells of two different species. And, knowing scientists as I think I do, a chimera called a "geep" can only be one thing. Yes, this week's Animal of the Week.

Apparently, if you put a sheep and a goat in a blender and then leave to stand, the cells don't separate out and you end up with a geep. You clearly have to do this at a very early embryonic stage, leave it too late and you end up with so much doner meat. But if you blend embryonic cells of the two animals and then implant the resulting mash into a host womb (preferably a sheep or a goat) a fully functioning, four-footed beast will grow. Some parts of the body develop from sheep cells and others from goat cells. In the picture, you see the legs are woolly (sheep) and the back hairy (goat). Unlike a hybrid animal (such as the wholphin AOTW 25/04/05) which has two parents from two species, a geep has four parents from two species. Put that in your pipe and smoke it Nicole Bradford!

Animal of the Week July 31, 2006 -- Make it stop!

**WARNING: CONTAINS STRONG ASTERISKS**
Right, look, I know Sundays are traditionally a day of family outings, long lunches, and quiet down time, but there are vast swathes of people who, in the late afternoon, want to vegetate in front of the television. In a world in which every tinpot organisation has a tv channel, I guess the following statement is going to make me look like a bumpkin extolling the virtues of scythes over those of combine harvesters, but I believe that five channels should be enough, and only have the old terrestrial package. So, yesterday afternoon, with the effects of the previous night's party kicking in, I slumped into an armchair, switched the television on, and picked up the tv guide. My viewing options were as follows:

BBC1: As Time Goes By -- Geoffrey Palmer and Judi Dench besmirch their careers with tawdry snail-paced "comedy"; a repeat.
BBC2: Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em -- Perenially repeated "classic" sitcom, many hold this in great affection so I'm not going to slag it off too much, but every episode must have been shown at least 100 times in the past 20 years, and in all fairness the only three jokes in any episode are Frank Spencer's silly voice, his ill-fitting clothes, and him falling off a roof.
ITV: Call Me A Cabbie -- in which celebrities who have unfortunately been brought back from the jungle (the two greatest problems with I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here are that it's televised and that any of the participants are ever allowed "out of here" [although I'd watch "Celebrity Lost", in which there is no hope of rescue and every chance of mauling by a polar bear]) face the challenges of learning The Knowledge and picking up mockerny accents under the tutelage of a cabbie mentor. The celebrities, you ask: Janet "Ramblin'" Street-Porter, Carol "Iron Mumsy" Thatcher, and Jeff "ex-Mr Jade Goodie" Brazier. Words cannot describe my feelings about this concept (they can actually, but the image I have concocted cannot be broadcast for fear of offending people, those of strong constitutions might like to ask me about this). Call Me A Cabbie is surely the lowest TV ever created...Oh wait
Channel 4: Britain's Top Dog -- Each episode, four untrained dogs and owners from a different region (this week, the southwest) are selected by a panel of three judges then given intensive training before they compete by perfoming agility exercises, scent-trials, and doggie dancing. I have no idea what the point in this show is, perhaps to showcase the complete lack of appropriate care for people with mental incapacities in the regions featured. The normalised insanity of the westcountry truck driver who takes his shelti waterskiing and motorbike riding and the woman with 16 dogs were completely overshadowed by the three-time divorcee whose jack russel had become her fourth husband (when we first see them in their everyday life, she is receiving a massage, the dog is beneath the massage table licking her mouth and she DOESN'T TELL IT TO GET OUT OF THE MASSAGE PARLOUR, BUT SHE KISSES ITS FILTHY DOG TONGUE!!!). Liza Tarbuck, presumably taking huge amounts of ritalin to remain focused on the hyperbanal pile of crap, guides us through the show, and although she never really manages to sound excited she does a fantastic job of not slitting her wrists live on air as a poodle stands still for a full minute completely failing to give a damn about its owner's stolen wallet that has been secreted in the turn up of a mock-theif's trouser leg in the scent trial. The absolute nadir was watching the trucker getting so excited about doggie dancing that he put in hours of intensive extra training and at one point tried to get the dog to jump through his legs as he did a headstand. This was, it turns out, the third of four regional heats. It's f*ing Dog Idol, and it's wrong, wrong, wrong... please read the middle column of this webpage (http://www.channel4.com/about4/overview.html) then consider the show I have just described. F*ed up.
Channel 5 -- Robocop: The Future of Law Enforcement (fourth part of awful film franchise -- I'd have considered watching this but had missed the first half hour, so probably wouldn't be able to work out what was going on).

But salvation was at hand, in just a few minutes, when Frank Spencer had received an amusingly placed bandage and supremely embarassed himself in front of his mother in law for the fiftieth time (I didn't watch it, but I know these things happened), The Natural World would start. Nature documentaries, that's what Sunday should be about! I decided that whatever it was that was the subject this show would be AOTW. Turns out though, scheduling and programme making had been taken over by three year olds and that The Natural World was one of those god awful storybook accounts called The Monkey Prince in which Kristin Scott-Thomas, providing the narrative voice of a baby female monkey born into a troop of monkeys in India, told the tale of a fellow baby monkey, born to a high ranking female, but cast out after his mother died, but who then rose to the highest rank after surviving many precarious adventures in his life. Suffice to say it was f*ing sh*. First off, they didn't even tell you what type of bloody monkey it was. Why we were supposed to believe this was not just a re-edited footage from six different old documentaries to provide a blatant rip-off of the Lion King, I do not know. White-Ear, Long-Tooth, and Nine-Fingers and the rest were probably all real monkey's, but why, after naming the troop after physical attributes, The Monkey Prince, the longsuffering but triumphant focus, was called Bobo, and not No-Mum or something, I cannot fathom.

So, this week's animal of the week is Macaca mulatta (rhesus macaque), an animal so interesting there are at least three informative documentaries that could be made about it without people becoming bored. Named after a King of Thrace, these animals have given their name to a blood factor—if you're blood type is A negative, the negative refers to a lack of the rhesus factor—that was discovered in them. Widely used in research these are the archetypal primate research model and have facilitated numerous medical and scientific breakthroughs and the focus of many campaigns against animal experimentation. Rhesus macaques live across south Asia, from Pakistan to Thailand; they are highly adaptable, living in hot arid regions, forests, and even mountainous areas where the temperature might regularly fall well-below freezing. In areas where breeding is seasonal, the male's already large testes swell even more during the mating season. Both males and females have strict dominance hierarchies: one male fathers most of the offspring in a troop until he is deposed by a younger, stronger male; the highest ranking female will have best access to food and protection from the males. In China and Thailand, competition with and exploitation by people have forced them onto the margins of existence, in India they have adapted to life with humans, and in some places troops live in metropolitan areas. Not one of these facts would you have gleaned from watching The Natural World yesterday. Sentimental tosh. Grrrrr!

I turned back to the dogs for a bit; then gave up and went to check that the gas was still working in the oven and that our toaster flex stretches to the bath in case such a situation ever arises again.

I thinkyou thanks

Animal of the Week July 24, 2006 -- Ginormous Jellyfish of Japan

Hola!

A couple of months ago, the humble mayfly was AOTW, after a couple of days of mass hatchings and dyings the insects have been known to clogg up cooling-water intake pipes of nuclear power plants. Well, now other invertebrates are getting in on the anti-nuclear act, Chubu Electric had to reduce production at the Hamaoka power plant to 60% when not enough cooling seawater could be sucked up due to the pipes being blocked by this week's animal Stomolophus nomurai (Nomura's jellyfish, echizen kurage). Whatever next, CND centipedes?

These giant jellyfish have been appearing in unusually large numbers around the west coast of Japan for the past few years. As densities have exceeded 100 times the normal levels, fishermen in the Sea of Japan trying to catch anchovies, shrimp, and the like have been thwarted by the jellyfish, the weight of which would break their nets. If they did manage to haul a net aboard intact it would be filled with either a lump of jellyfish or fish so slimed up and poisoned that they could not be sold.

The danger posed by the jellyfish is probably quite minor—nuclear power companies are used to having to clear typhoon debris, swarms of shrimp, or the occasional dolphin from their cooling pipes. Although the 2 m wide, 200 kg jellies can sting, their poison is only very rarely fatal to human beings.

However, what should happen if the jellyfish make it to the nuclear source?! As a child, I remember seeing in the news a story about a giant radioactive moth attacking Japan, they had to get this dinosaur type thing to sort that out.

Should you be stung by a jellyfish this anchovy season, remember that weeing on the sting as recommended by the school of received wisdom is not a good idea, it'll cause more poison to be released. Ideally apply a weak solution of vinegar, if no vinegar is available, use bicarbonate of soda, if this is unavailable, use meat tenderiser (apply for no longer than 10 minutes). If you are not in a kitchen when stung, wash with sea water (that you have first carefully inspected for jellyfish).

Revisit some of the old Animals of the Week at http://animal-of-the-week.blogspot.com/ I don't like blogs, but what can you do?

Ta

Ps, if anyone knows any cheap accomodation with good access to South Kensington in London that will be available from the September 22-ish, give me a shout.

Animal of the Week July 10, 2006 -- World Cup Nations 5 Italy are the Champions

Hey Kids,

I so nearly chose some form of headbutting goat as French AOTW last week, gutted that I didn't, pah! I loved Zidane's caprine charge, much more graceful than the jolting Glasgow kiss with which we are more familiar in modern times. Not that I watched the match you understand... oh no.

Well, that's football done for another 4 years. And as the World Cup wings its way to Italy, this week's Animal is in memory of another item that will hopefully be returning to the boot of Europe, JJ1 (Bruno the bear). The 2-year-old member of the subspecies Ursos arctos arctos (European brown bear) was born in Italy in the Adamello-Brenta natural park of the Trentino, South Tyrol, region of northern Italy, but had a somewhat less successful trip to Germany than the Italian football team.

The return of a bear to Germany after a 170 year absence of the species was initially heralded as a landmark event in the repopulation of Europe by bruins. The bear's stereotypical behaviour delighted me, the first report I read had him raiding a beehive for the honey. I was awaiting the news that he had been witnessed pilfering pickernick baskets. Although he did frustrate the local rangers for a while, he fatally moved onto a diet of sheep, rabbits, chickens, goats, and a for dessert a guinea pig, and from then on started to rankle German authorities. Brown bears can kill a cow with a single blow of a paw, outrun a horse, and swim faster than an Olympic swimmer. Farmers were upset by loss of stock, and people worried that Bruno's apparent lack of fear of humans could pose a threat to people as he came into close proximity with them. Attempts to capture him alive so that he could be relocated failed, Bruno evaded capture for several weeks. Finally the authorities declared open season on the ursine marauder and he was shot at the end of June. At the Italy vs Germany semifinal, fans waved banners calling for revenge for Bruno. Italy have now asked for JJ1's body to be sent back, although the most recent reports said that the plan was to stuff the 2 m animal and install it in a museum in Bavaria.

Over the past 10 years, Italy has had some success in reintroducing this majestic predator to some regions and, along with Slovenia and Austria, is helping to re-establish populations of bears throughout the south-central Alps -- not to be confused with the "bears" of South Central, Vauxhall.

Not really a happy story for Bruno, but perhaps this episode will encourage people in Germany and elsewhere to consider how they might one day live side by side with bears as they recolonise Europe. The species has begun to make a comeback in France and Switzerland as well. Whatever, the North Sea and English channel should keep me safe from the advances of the bears...

Animal of the Week July 03, 2006 -- World Cup Nations 4 (France)

I guess many of you are reeling from the results over the weekend (although not the Sri Lankan, Portuguese, German, and Italian readers—do I have any French recipients?). I was so mortified I had to have an extra day to gather my thoughts. Anyhoo, now I can no longer preempt England's opponents, how do I choose the featured nation? By adopting England's nemesis Portugal, that's how.

So, on Wednesday the land of sardines will face the land of…Threskiornis solitarius (the Réunion sacred ibis)! I am well bored of Europe…but Réunion is département d’outre mer of France in the Indian Ocean. So while its residents tender Euros, the fauna of Réunion is somewhat different to that of Portugal and Sweden (unlike France's hybrid of the two). The first Europeans to land on Réunion were, rather serendipitously, Portuguese sailors in the early 1500s; however, by the mid 1600s the French had taken control, and the island, east of Madagascar and about 200 km south of Mauritius, was officially a part of France, as it is to this day.

The first people to name the large, nearly flightless, bird of Réunion called it a solitaire, a name also given to a close relative of the dodo found on the island of Rodrigues (in the Mascarene islands, a part of Mauritius). This name, descriptive of its solitary habits rather than its similarity to the Rodrigues solitaire, led people to classify the Réunion sacred ibis, then only known from historical reports, as an albino dodo or Réunion solitaire. A few year ago, however, bones discovered on the island clearly showed that the bird was no more a dodo than I am really interested in the football. Instead, the bird was most similar to the sacred ibis of Madagascar, mainland Africa, and the aviary along the Regents Canal by Primrose Hill, London.

Ibises are wading birds of marsh and shoreline. And for a while the Réunion sacred ibis happily roamed the island preying on ostensibly Portuguese cockles and winkles, but the settlement of the island by the French was like a red-card from an Argentine referee for the sacred ibis. By the late 1600s the birds were very scarce, the last sighting was in 1705, by which time the species was as doomed as a failed England coach.

Join me next week for a final celebration of the world´s most ............ sporting event.

Animal of the Week June 26, 2006 -- World Cup Nations 3 (Portugal)

So, Portugal eh, apparently football is the national sport of Portugal, just as, after kabaddi, it is in England. But what about an animal to symbolise Portugal, welcome this week’s animal of the week Sardina pilchardus (sardine, sardinha [Portuguese]). Given England's love for these little beasts served from an iconic rectangular tin, you might be excused for thinking that they could be this nation's animal too, but herein lies the fundamental difference between these two outposts of western Europe, the Portuguese love them fresh.

In Portugal, 90% of the sardines are consumed not from a can, but straight from the sea. The way to eat your sardines is apparently simply grilled, preferably over charcoal served with boiled potatoes and a salad of grilled green peppers, basil, and olive oil, sounds delicious; I’m going to Hatt’s fishmonger first chance I get.

This celebration of the sardine in Portugal would have been more appropriate a couple of weeks ago, for June 13 was St Anthony’s feast day, when people take to the streets of Lisbon to feast on sardines cooked over open grills on the street. Sardine season lasts from April to November when the plumpest fish can be caught in abundance in the eastern Atlantic by the traditional Portuguese fisheries.

What is a sardine? Well, you may gather from the Latin name that Sardina pilchardus are actually pilchards, and the contents of your can of sardines and your can of pilchards are the same species, sardines are simply younguns. But what is a pilchard? In fact there are at least six species of fish called pilchard and at least 12 called just sardine. So it’s all rather complicated—but hey, they all look pretty much the same when barbecued or squished three to a can with tomato sauce.

As a nod to the wonderful country of Ecuador, here is a song about llamas http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/llama.php. Sorry if you have seen it before. I've watched it too many times and am numb to it now but if you've not seen it, well, you might be amused...or scared.

RIP Bruno

Animal of the Week June 19, 2006 -- World Cup Nations 2 (Sweden)

Hello all,

This week's animal is the unofficial animal of Sweden, Alces alces (elk, Älg [Swedish]). In North America these animals are known as moose (from the native American Algonquian word 'moos' meaning 'leaf eater'), but, as we are on Sweden this week for our World Cup nations themed animal of the week, it's elk all the way. With a population of 250 000 elk, Sweden has the highest density of and the best chance of spotting this magnificent creature anywhere in all the world.

Elk are the largest member of the deer family alive today and, in many places where they occur (as in Sweden), the largest terrestrial animal. They are also quite dangerous, males during the rut and females when with a calf have been know to attack people. By far the greatest danger to human beings posed by elk is that of road accidents. With a high centre of gravity, upon impact with a car the spindly legs snap and 500 kg of venison and antler shoot through the windshield with disastrous consequences for elk and motorists. The Älgtest (Elk-test) was developed to test rapid cornering of cars to simulate navigation around an elk in the road at high speeds. Saab's elk test includes simulated collision with elk to test their reinforced windshield.

Across their range, road signs warn of this risk; attached is the Swedish interpretation. Like a nation of drunken students, German tourists find these warning signs hilarious and make trips to Sweden to gather them. The Swedes have made it a criminal offense to take the roadsigns and instead have produced a range of tourist tat bearing the roadsign image. Postage stamps in the form of the warning sign were even developed to appeal to the German tourists sending postcards home. The elk warning sign is Sweden's equivalent of our royal family.

Stepping away from Sweden, in Fairbanks Alaska, it is illegal to give a moose alcohol. One wonders why they had to instigate this law at all but also why here and nowhere else?

If you should meet an elk, here are some simple survival tips.

1. If you meet an elk on a path, turn around and walk away, this is what elk do when recognising another elk's superiority.
2. Never get between a cow and her calf.
3. Try to get behind a tree if an elk charges. You can run around the tree better than it can.
4. Remember, if you see its ears laid back and/or the hair on its "hump" stand up, it's angry or afraid and may charge.
5. Elk can kick with their front legs as well as their back.
6. If there is an elk in the road in front of you, be patient, wait for it to move.

It occured to me that I should be preempting England matches rather than covering the nations retrospectively. So, unfortunately, Trinidad and Tobago gets skipped. But look out for a T&T special when the world cup is over.

Remember to play safe and enjoy/endure the World Cup responsibly and with respect for your fellow human beings.

Animal of the Week June 12, 2006 -- World Cup Nations I (Paraguay)

Good Monday one and all,

Those of you who know me will know how excited I am about the World Cup! Not one bit, which explains why I am trailing a week behind with my nations-themed animals. This week's animal Chlamyphorus retusus (pichiciego, fairy armadillo) is an inhabitant of the Gran Chaco, an area of dry scrubland with rich plant and animal diversity in the homeland of this weekend's losers against England, Paraguay.

There are two species of fairy armadillo in South America, surprisingly the pichiego is the less gay of the two, the other being the smaller "pink fairy armadillo" (Chlamyphorus truncatus). The fairy armadillos are less heavily armoured than some of their cousins, being noted for their downy white hair on their sides and bellies. Both species are able diggers. Thankfully, after last week's epic, not a great deal is known about these animals except that they sometimes make a noise like the crying of a human baby. They survive largely on a diet of ants and grubs, although one individual kept in captivity survived solely on a diet of grapefruit and rice. How long it survived on this diet is not reported.

And wow, look at the size of these guys' hands, maybe if Paraguay had had one of these as goal defender on Saturday afternoon the British wouldn't have been able to score a bullseye in the first chukka. Come on the lads!

Animal of the Week June 5, 2006 -- Islington to Camden on a sunny morning or Gulls kill pigeons by drowning them

If you need to get from Islington to Camden on a sunny morning you could do worse than take a stroll along the Regent's Canal. From Angel tube, cross the large junction to Liverpool Road. Head up Liverpool Road a short way and turn left by the far side of Sainsbury's onto Tolpuddle Street, walk the length of this thoroughfare, at the end, turn right and sharp left onto Maygood. Walk through the Maygood Estate (a perfectly tasteful Islingtonian estate, in the afternoon the teenagers play football in the basketball courts [how obtuse?] and shout obscenities about a transvestite on the new series of Big Brother "No but mate, we all fancied her till we found out", "Yeah, I f* did" -- which is honest of them). Cross Muriel Street and head down the ramp to the canal. You are now at the west end of the Islington Tunnel, you can only head away from the rising sun. Head west.

The air is thick with the scents and pollen of mayflowers and cow parsley; hayfever sufferers would be wise to take a Claritin or somesuch before the journey. Robins and wrens chatter in the bushes. Blackbirds root noisily through the leaf litter. As you walk along the canal look out for the various families of ducks, moorhens, and coots that swarm busily, chasing midges and other insects along the mirrored surface of the water, shattering the reflections of cotton-wool clouds in their wake. Lone fishermen's eyes droop contentedly as their rods dip to the water, floats bobbing gently, unbothered by fish. Cyclists' bells chime as they clatter under the bridges: Caledonian Road, York Way (where I doff my cap to the Macmillan building). At Camley Street nature garden look out for the terrapin that sometimes floats in the surface of the water or basks on a floating beam alongside the ducklings.

The canal now finds the north in its bearings. At St Pancras Lock a pair of coots brood a late clutch of eggs in the weir. Flotsam and jetsam lap against the lock gates, floating rafts break through each time a boat passes. Where on the earlier, western, stretch cow parsley and alexanders were the most prominent flowers, the verges on this northwestern segments are overshadowed by nodding spotty stems of hemlock, some reaching eight or nine feet tall. Pass the man doing tai chi, well it looks like tai chi, but I think he is a mental making it up, though I am no expert. You'll pass The Constitution (affectionately labelled The Con in the graffiti on the canalside wall), which I am reliably informed is a good pub although I have yet to sample it's delights (including a free barbecue on a Sunday night and a spacious waterside garden). Go under St Pancras bridge, there is another floating beam, in the winter a pair of red crested poachards (the only duck of the region with a bright red bill) could often be seen perched there. The other day, this beam looked to be crowded with a family of mallards, on closer inspection they turned out to be a covey of pigeons. As I got closer, the pigeons were rattled and tried to take to the air, but before they could clear the area this week's animal of the week swooped in, a Larus argentatus (herring gull), its wings, feet, neck and head all outstretched to give maximum coverage. As the gull bowled into the panicked pigeons, one was knocked into the water. The pigeon managed to haul itself onto the beam again, but now waterlogged it could not take to the air. The gull went up to it and knocked it into the water again. The pigeon flapped pitiful trying to distance itself from it's marauder. But the gull swooped down, ducking the hapless bird once, twice, three times. Eventually, warn out, waterlogged, and beaten, the pigeon throbbed limply in the middle of the canal, it's time was up and soon the gull would eat.

The beam generally isn't that interesting, so you'll probably keep walking, under Royal College street, then the very narrow Camden Road bridge, pedestrians and cyclists generally whoop or whistle as they enter to avoid the inevitable crash (I typically whistle a southern gospel song as I pass through the UV lit tunnel -- they use UV I guess to stop the junkies finding their veins). Here the quality of walk deteriorates, young punks drinking cider at eight in the morning sit on the lock outside the TVam/MTV building, where herring gulls perch atop masonry eggs, looking for all the world as though they are trying to hatch an outsized chick. Piles of vomit, discarded beer cans, half eaten kebabs (from Zula Vegetarian and Chicken which once was Tasty Corner), the detritus left by Camden's crapulous rogues.

Next week: Camden to Islington in the afternoon, 214 or 274?

Animal of the Week May 29, 2006 -- Potter dragon dinosaur simon and garfunkel

Oh my god, this is amazing! A flat-headed pachycephalosaur from the late cretaceous of North America. They've only been found in Asia before. And that's one in the eye for all the people who think that the flat headed type preceded the dome heads! What...?! You're not interested in that? Are you crazy?! Oh, OK then, we'll appropriate a name from some wildly popular cultural phenomenon... cool, lets say it looks like a dragon from the Harry Potter series and name it Dracorex hogwartsia. Now you're interested right?

I'm sure you're all reading Proust, Cervantes, and selected essays by Hazlitt rather than kids' books (unless you're a kid, although nephew, Thomas, is most likely reading some weighty tome about dinosaurs), so I'll explain that Hogwarts is the school of wizardry at which Harry Potter is annoyingly successful at everything, is inexplicably excused all manner of misdemeanours, and despite being a despicable sycophant remains popular with staff and peers -- so I am told.

This newly discovered dinosaur lived 66 million years ago, the twilight years of the dinosaurs, in South Dakota, the twighlight state of the USA. Its thick skull and collection of bumps, knobs, and spikes suggest that like other pachycephalosaurs D hogwartsia fought by head-butting. The ornamentation of their heads led to comparisons to a dragon described in one of Rowling's books and hence the name given by palaeontologist Robert Bakker.

Bakker has form so to speak, other dinosaurs he has named include Attenborosaurus (after David), Bambiraptor (after Disney's deer), and Drinker nisti (after the National Institutes of Standards and Technology -- part of the US Dept of Commerce). Still, Bakker is by no means the worst offender for such tomfoolery, Leigh Van Valen spent much of the 70s naming extinct mammals of North America after obscure characters and objects from The Lord of the Rings. My present favourite examples of naming species after things are two trilobites (extinct sea creatures) in the genus Avalanchurus with the species names simoni and garfunkeli. Should I ever have a child I will call it Garfunkeli.

Animal of the Week May 22, 2006 -- Marriage special, the most metaphorical animal

Marriage special
In honour of the impending nuptials of my sister and my soon to be brother-in-tax break *ducks to avoid clips round the ear*, this week's animal is one of the classic examples of monogamy, an albatross, Diomedea epomophora (royal albatross) to be specific.

Like other albatrosses, royals pair for life. Within the first 10 years of their lives they'll arrive at a breeding ground, a single boy albatross and a single girl albatross will furtively glance at each other, he'll sidle up to her or she to he in these enlightened times, they'll do a courtship dance: head nodding, pointing their bills to the sky, braying, stretching out their wings and strutting around, sometimes flying in tandem, occasionally exchanging gifts of fish, then they will be married—S&D, is it too late to change the ceremony?

They'll immediately leave the breeding island and feed for a few weeks, building up their reserves on a piscivorous honeymoon. On returning to the island the female lays an enormous egg and will immediately fly out to sea to replenish the energy put into the egg. The male will incubate the egg until the female returns to take over the duties. The adults exchange egg and chick duties for the next year or so. Eventually, when the chick is old enough, they'll desert it, returning to the open ocean. The chick eventually fledges when hunger drives it to flight.

Every two years the pair will return to the same nest site, consolidate their bond with a replica of their marriage dance and repeat. These birds might live for over sixty years, so remain faithful to their partners for upwards of fifty. That is as long as they don't get snagged by a longline fishing vessel.

So, while not a model to replicate in your marriage (the months at sea may be difficult to manage), this one's for you S&D, wishing you the best for Saturday and beyond (what a present, eh? No-one else has got you this *gleefully puts away credit card and logs out of the wedding list*).

Animal of the Week May 15, 2006 -- Brown rabbit

Oh wow... what a weekend I had! I went to this crazy music festival on the south coast of England at a Pontin’s holiday camp. It was like Hi-Di-Hi but with Ruth Maddock, Paul Shane, Sue Pollard and the rest replaced by avant-garde folk and rock musicians... And it was wow so much fun, the music was great and the good-times rolled well into the evenings.

One evening I was sat up looking at the stars. And you know how it is when you look at the stars and you stare at the nearest and the brightest and then when you've focused on them you, like, see another layer behind them, and then you focus on those, and behind them, there are even more stars even further away and even smaller. But when you've been staring for a couple of hours it seems that the once inky-black night sky is just a carpet of white starlight travelling millions of billions of trillions of miles into your eyes. And I felt really small, like so small that I may as well not even have existed. But my hands felt so big, like they were reaching off into the universe, my interplanetary pinky poking Pluto and the thumb on the same hand shooting out through the Milky Way. With my fingertips I could feel the ripples of the big bang.

I was looking at the stars and lying on a sand dune and suddenly, I saw The Oryctolagus cuniculus (The Rabbit), staring at the stars too. I say The Oryctolagus cuniculus, because this was the first rabbit brought here by the Romans (hence the Latin name). She is about 2000 years old and the origin of all the bunnies in the UK, a rabbit god. And she turned to me and said. "Let me tell you a story", and I was like, "OK". And she said "Once, I was here sat watching one of my children eating grass minding its own business, but behind a tree there was a cat stalking the rabbit, the rabbit was oblivious to the cat's presence, and the cat was biding it's time, I could see the muscle tension in the cat's hind legs coiling in preparation for the pounce. But, unknown to the cat, behind another tree there was a badger, hungry and old, it had seen the cat and thought it might try its luck. But the badger was oblivious to the lynx, which still lived here then, behind the tree, eyeing up old brock. And the tufty ears was not conscious of the wolf, and the wolf unaware of the bear, and the bear had not noticed the angry old cow bison wanting to exact revenge for too many lost calves. Just as the kitty was about to pounce, badger dived upon the cat, the lynx leapt on the badger, the wolf jumped the lynx, the bear grabbed the wolf, and the bison trampled the bear. Ancient, and old, and finally at peace the bison lay down and died. And the only animal left was the rabbit, which grew old and had many kittens who would come and gorge themselves on the grass that grew rich where the all the bodies had decayed."

I was like, "Wow, that's an amazing story", and The Rabbit was like,"I know". And then I asked The Rabbit why she spoke with a Mexican accent. But she just formed a lagomorphic pyramid with her rabbit kin and they skipped away, The Rabbit on top juggling tiny moons.

How was your weekend?My summary: Nu-folk musicians touched=4. Favourite apple=Cox.

Animal of the Week May 8, 2006 -- Mayflies

"What a difference a day makes, 24 little hours..." Dinah Washington new what she was singing about, she was singing about Ephemeroptera (mayflies). I know I normally do a single species and not a whole order of animals, but really, as if I am going to want to cover mayflies in AOTW again...*

There are over 2000 species of mayflies, and this group is one of the most ancient of insect orders. All mayflies are characterised by a short adult life lasting, in most cases, no more than a day; although they have a larval stage or nymph that lasts from a few weeks to several years. The nymphs live in fresh water rivers or streams, feedings and preparing for a frenetic adulthood. Commonly huge swarms explode from rivers over a very short period, at this time fish, birds, and, in some parts of the world, humans gorge themselves on the glut of crunchy goodness. In temperate Europe and North America most of the hatches happen between April and July. So any day now folks. Nuclear reactor workers do well to prepare for the hatchings as the masses of dead mayflies have been known to block the intake of water for cooling.

People thinking of eating mayflies should remain mindful of the story of Deichtine. In Irish myth, the god Lugh, in the form of a mayfly, landed in Deichtine's drink and after being swallowed made her pregnant with Setanta (who later adopted the name Cuchulainn and became one of the great heroes of Ulster). Not sure if that can really happen, but it's probably best to cover your mouth if beholding the spectacle of a mayfly hatch.

The mayfly in this picture is Ephemera danica, the UK's biggest mayfly and a popular model for fishermen's flies.
What a difference a day made
Twenty-four little hours
Brought the sun and the mayflies
Where there used to be rain
My yesterday was blue, dear
Today I'm part of you, dear
My lonely nights are through, dear
Since you said you were mine
What a difference a day makes
There's a rainbow before me
Skies above can't be full of mayflies
Since that moment of bliss, that thrilling kiss
It's heaven when you find mayflies on your menu
What a difference a day made
And the difference is mayflies

*Oh yeah, next May

Animal of the Week May 1, 2006 -- Probably the rarest mammal in the world

Happy Summer (Or winter for those in the antipodes, if you're non-seasonal, lucky you)

Some animals make me doubt my faith in evolution and wonder whether some prankster has been guiding the development of at least a few species. For example, pandas, on a branch of the family tree sprouted somewhere bears and raccoons (two generally adaptable groups of animals), the ancestors of this large should-be carnivore decided to ditch the meat eating and become veggie. Not only did they choose to foresake highly nutritious viands, but they decided to subsist solely on a diet of a highly un-nutritious grass of which they would eat only selected shoots that appear every few years.

Similarly, river dolphins... in the oceans of the world, dolphin species travel in enormous numbers, sometimes gathering in groups of thousands, frolicking abundantly in vast, clear, fish-packed waters. But on several occasions in Asia and South America a couple of dolphins have looked at the murky silt-choked effluent of major rivers and thought "I know, I'll try my luck". And so, this week's animal of the week, the possibly extinct Lipotes vexillifer (Baiji, Yangtze river dolphin), probably the world's rarest mammal.

Like other river dolphins, Baijis have very poor vision, they use echolocation and their long slightly upturned beak to search for fish in riverbed silt. Never the most abundant animal, commercial and illegal fishing practices along the Yangtze depleted the population, and damming has further adversely affected fish stock; chemical and noise pollution have also made life hard for the baijis. A few years ago, a survey found only 13 individuals, and a preliminary study, the reults of which were released last week, found no signs of these cetaceans. In November this year, a larger study hopes to find some remnant groups... but it looks very likely that the baiji will become the first whale or dolphin to become extinct in the modern era. Various groups are trying to conserve this species, but it seems they may already have lost their porpoise *Hayward gets coat*.

PS, as I was typing last week's AOTW, a couple of hundred yards away London Zoo were preparing to release the news of the virgin birth of four Komodo dragons. Hatched from eggs laid by a female with no male consort for two years, the paternity of these baby dragons remains a mystery. But welcome little Christ-lizards, welcome to Camden!

Animal of the Week April 24, 2006 -- George and the Komodo

Apologies:
1. For not acknowledging the wonderful source journal Nature for AOTW April 10 (Tiktaalik roseae)
2. For not warning y'all that I'd take Easter Monday off... sorry

Yesterday was the day of St George, England's patron saint, I marked the day by having a lie in, buying some tomato plants, some breadmaking, and listening to folk music on Radio 3. And today I extend the festivities by choosing as the animal of the week the dragon.... er, Varanus komodoensis (Komodo dragon) that is!

The fire-breathing dragon that crusader George slayed held the pagan people of some distant land to ransom by taking up residence in the spring from whence they obtained their water. To get the dragon to move on, the local monarch had to give up his daughter, but just as the dragon was about to eat the princess, valiant George turned up and showed the dragon what for with his lance. Everyone was so glad for what George had done they converted to Christianity.

Komodo dragons can't breath fire, don't much care to hold wells to ransom, and aren't mythical allegories for Satan; however, they can be quite terrifying—weighing over 160 kg and growing to over 3·5 m long they are the largest lizards in the whole world (note, crocodiles, alligators, and turtles are not lizards). These outsize monitor lizards are the top predators on the Indonesian islands of Flores, Rintja, Padar, and Komodo where they eat anything that moves including goats, horses, buffalo, other komodo dragons, and sometimes people. Before people reached these islands wiping out native fauna and bringing in the smorgasbord listed above, Komodo dragons' diets probably comprised giant rats, dwarf elephants, and er, dwarf proto-humans.

Komodo dragons do enjoy carrion, but they are also well-equipped hunters, adept at both ambush and the chase. Their best trick though is having over 50 species of bacteria in their saliva, which means that all they need to do is give a prey animal a little nip and the victim will rapidly be overcome by septicaemia. Lovely!

In this picture a komodo dragon is receiving acupuncture... perhaps the whole George-dragon-lance story is a misunderstanding.