Valentine's Day

"Forgetting Valentine's Day, is he?"

More, or less:

• "The Touch of a Vanished Hand"
  (October 30, 2015)
• "Narcissus-X Proffers Plenteous Provisos"
  (August 14, 2015)
• "Another Holiday for the Lemming"
  (August 7, 2015)
• "Gone for the Weekend"
  (July 4, 2014)
• "Of Ravens and Rhymes: But Not Writing-Desks"
  (February 14, 2014)

Tryouts at the Consulate: Hamlet

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him well, Horatio.

No, wait. That can't be right. Let me think.

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him well, Horatius.

There's still something wrong here. How would a fellow of infinite jest hold off an army? More to the point: why? There's something else. Give me a moment. It's on the tip of my radula.

Got it! Hamlet lived just after the Black Death, right? No, wait. That was Shakespeare. Hamlet lived a thousand of your seasonal cycles before that, roughly: or am I thinking of that other chap? Some sort of revolutionary. How did that Rome thing work out, anyway? Your lettering looks like theirs.

I think I have it now. Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him well, Hortense. Oh, bother.

What's that? Don't call you, you'll call me?

How about Ophelia? Have you cast that part yet?

Related posts:

• "From the Mind of the Lemming: Xanadu Springs"
  (June 20, 2014)
• "Holiday for the Lemming; or Time, Tide, and a Tired Lemming; or the Lemming Takes a Break"
  (June 6, 2014)
• "From the Mind of the Lemming: The Lemming's Walking Stick"
  (May 23, 2014)
• "From the Mind of the Lemming: A Far Horizon"
  (May 16, 2014)
• "From the Mind of the Lemming: Just Outside Hobbiton (maybe)"
  (April 18, 2014)

Gerbils are Not Hamsters

The Lemming recently discovered that gerbils are not hamsters. Well, of course they're not hamsters: if they were, they'd be called hamsters, and the Lemming would have to find something else to write about.

Gerbils aren't mice, either. They're gerbils.

The point is that hamsters live in hamster houses: those colorful plumbing nightmares you see on television sometimes. Or in pet stores.

Hamster houses are fine for hamsters, partly because hamsters don't mind prefab tunnels: and apparently don't eat plastic. Not often, anyway.

Gerbils, in sharp contradistinction (yes, it's a real word), dig their own tunnels: or try to. They also eat plastic, including the sort that hamster houses are made of.

Gerbils shouldn't eat plastic, but it's no use trying to educate a gerbil on the consequences of chowing down on synthetic tunnels. They eat the stuff anyway, after which their owner learns what a Wikipedia page meant by "serious health issues."

The same resource says that folks have quite a few opinions about how much space a gerbil needs:

"...Information from gerbil societies from throughout the globe is conflicting with regards to tank sizing. However, a common minimum given appears to be 10 imperial gallons per gerbil...."
(Housing in captivity, Gerbil, Wikipedia)

The page doesn't say so, but the Lemming assumes that the "tank" should be filled with air, not water: maybe that's obvious, but we live in an era of stupid warning labels, and that's another topic.

And why, the Lemming wonders, in this liberated age, should gerbils insist on imperial gallons? Do they consider common gallons beneath their dignity? And who ever heard of a house pet with royal pretensions, anyway?

Pretensions are not the same as pre-tensioned concrete, which is a fairly common structural material these days: and the Lemming's mind is wandering.

Again.

Finally, this is a gerbil:


(From Roo72, via Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission.)

This is not a gerbil:


(From JJ Harrison, via Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission.)

It's not a hamster, either, and that's yet another topic.

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Save the - Goldfish?!"
  (June 16, 2011)
• "A Good Dog: Not Bright, But a Good Dog"
  (December 3, 2010)
• "Hamsters: Cute; May or May Not be the Right Pet"
  (August 28, 2010)
• "Cute Baby Easter Bunnies, Responsibility, and a Charming Photo"
  (March 30, 2010)
• "More Photos of Cute Animals"
  (August 1, 2009)

Another - Thing - From the Burgess Shale

(Marianne Collins, via University of Toronto, used w/o permission)

"University of Toronto/Royal Ontario Museum scientists discover unusual 'tulip' creature"
Kim Luke, U of T News, University of Toronto (January 18, 2012)
"Lived in the ocean more than 500-million years ago

"A bizarre creature that lived in the ocean more than 500-million years ago has emerged from the famous Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies.

"Officially named Siphusauctum gregarium, fossils reveal a tulip-shaped creature that is about the length of a dinner knife (approximately 20 centimetres) and has a unique filter feeding system.

"Siphusauctum has a long stem, with a calyx - a bulbous cup-like structure - near the top that encloses an unusual filter feeding system and a gut. The animal is thought to have fed by filtering particles from water actively pumped into its calyx through small holes. The stem ends with a small disc which anchored the animal to the seafloor. Siphusauctum lived in large clusters, as indicated by slabs containing over 65 individual specimens...."

These submerged tulip-animal-things were about as long as a butter knife: 8 inches, 20 centimeters.

If the Lemming's going to discuss Siphusauctum gregarium, those critters need a simpler name. How about siphon-sack? Sounds disgusting, maybe greggies? Siphums?

Siphums it is.

More than 1,100 siphums died in a mudslide somewhere between 505,000,000 and 510,000,000 years back. A half-billion years later, they're related to - nothing we know about.

Like other critters caught in the Burgess Shale, siphums were very well preserved: so scientists have a very good picture of how their innards fit together. They may not have had the colors we see in that picture, or maybe they did.

That article says the siphums are tulip-shaped. To the Lemming they look more like bell peppers, not that it really matters.

More Than You Need to Know About an Extinct Animal

"A New Stalked Filter-Feeder from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale, British Columbia, Canada"
Lorna J. O'Brien, Jean-Bernard Caron PLOS ONE (January 18, 2012)


(Lorna J. O'Brien, Jean-Bernard Caron, via PLOS ONE, used w/o permission)
"Figure 14. Schematics of the internal anatomy of Siphusauctum gregarium n. gen. and n. sp.

"A, longitudinal-section of the entire animal, with the major features labeled. B, cross-section of the calyx showing hexaradial symmetry. C, longitudinal-section of the calyx, showing raised comb segments above the level of the anus. Abbreviations: A - Anus, BC - Body Cavity, Con - Conical structure, CS - Comb Segments, ES - External Sheath, H - Holdfast, IC - Inner Conical structure with central tube, IS - Inner Stem, LD - Lower Digestive tract, MD - Middle Digestive tract, OS - Outer Stem, SP - Sheath Protrusion, TG - Transverse Groove, UD - Upper Digestive tract...."

If you still need to know more about Burgess Shale and the critters caught in it, the Lemming recommends www.burgess-shale.rom.on.ca.

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Another 17,000,000 Years on the Coelacanth Timeline"
  (April 16, 2012)
• "Eight-Foot Sea Scorpion: Big Claws; Sharp Spines; Weak; Clumsy"
  (January 4, 2011)
• "Ecological Disaster - a Quarter of a Billion Years Ago"
  (December 14, 2010)
• "Cambrian Explosion Evidence: Burgess Shale Fossils aren't Alone"
  (September 12, 2010)
• "Hurdia Victoria: Cambrian Supercritter of the Burgess Shale"
  (March 20, 2009)

Kleptomaniac Octopus: the Video

"octopus steals my video camera and swims off with it (while it's Recording)"

chimpsnatch, YouTube (April 15, 2010)
video 3:21

The Lemming has no trouble understanding why a human would chase after a kleptomaniac octopus. Humans like their tools, and that camera was a particularly valuable tool.

What an octopus would want with a camera: That is what puzzles the Lemming. It's not as if the octopus could have any use for the camera.

Unless, that is, humans aren't the only ones sharing videos on this planet.

Not-entirely-unrelated posts:

• "And Now, For Something Completely Different: Portable Buildings; and an Octopus Cartoon"
  (March 7, 2012)
• "Brainless Blobs Invade Hawaii! - Or - Attack of the Ctenophores!"
  (March 5, 2012)
• "Dumbo Octopus: Two Eyes, Eight Tentacles, and Wings"
  (February 1, 2010)
• "And Now, for Something Completely Different: Animated Octopuses - Octopods - Octopi - More Than One Animated Octopus"
  (November 13, 2009)
• "Squid Ink Still Good After 150,000,000 Years"
  (September 9, 2009)

EEK! Mice With Breakaway Skin!

" 'Scar free healing' in mice may give clues to human skin repair, says study"
James Gallagher, BBC News (September 26, 2012)

"Mice with brittle skin, which tears off in order to escape predators, may offer clues to healing wounds without scarring, according to US researchers.

"Some African spiny mice lost up to 60% of the skin from their backs, says the study published in the journal Nature.

"Unlike wounds in other mammals, the skin then rapidly healed and regrew hairs rather than forming a scar...."

Some critters, like salamanders, can regrow limbs. Mammals regrow scar tissue: handy for quick repairs, not so good as a replacement part. These oddball mice are an exception, at least where skin is involved.

The good news is that scientists may be able to figure out how the African spiny mice grow new skin, and develop ways for mammals to grow other sorts of tissue.

The bad news, sort of, is that someone will probably get upset about the process. Those mice look cute, and might not like losing skin from their backs: which the Lemming is concerned about; but learning how to regrow lost limbs or damaged organs would be nice, too. There's a balance, somewhere, between the welfare of mice and people. There are knee-jerk responses to new ideas, too: and that's another topic.

The Lemming found a rather detailed and boring discussion about the spiny mice on the NIH website:

More:

• "Could animal research lead to 'self-repairing skin'?"
  PubMed Health, U.S. Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (September 27, 2012)

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Mutant Mice Shed Light on Intestinal Bacteria"
  (October 14, 2011)
• " 'Cancer Causes Cell Phones!' - or, not"
  (July 18, 2011)
• "Hands off Driving, Driving With Your Brain, and All That"
  (March 4, 2011)
• "Livestock, Food, and Attack of the Clones"
  (August 7, 2010)
• "Glow-in-the-Dark Flashing Tattoos? Prosthetics With Neural Interfaces? They're Coming"
  (November 20, 2009)

Weirdly Beautiful Meat Eating Sponge

(from Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), via LiveScience.com, used w/o permission)
"...the recently discovered carnivorous harp sponge, Chondrocladia lyra, ... in Monterey Canyon, off the coast of California, at a depth of about 11,500 feet (3,500 meters)...."

"Weird-Looking, Meat-Eating Sponge Found In Deep Sea"
Becky Oskin, OurAmazingPlanet, via LiveScience.com (November 8, 2012)

" A new carnivore shaped like a candelabra has been spotted in deep ocean waters off California's Monterey Bay.

"The meat-eating species was dubbed the 'harp sponge,' so-called because its structure resembles a harp or lyre turned on its side.

"A team from the Monterey Bay Research Aquarium Institute in Moss Landing, Calif., discovered the sponge in 2000 while exploring with a remotely operated vehicle. The sponges live nearly 2 miles (3.5 kilometers) beneath the ocean's surface...."

The harp sponge probably wouldn't make a good movie monster. Mostly it just sits there, waiting for tiny critters to drift by and get caught in in the upright parts. This carnivorous sponge has dreadful table manners: it digests its prey by wrapping a membrane around it.

You might impress your friends by calling the harp sponge by its scientific name: Chondrocladia lyra. Then again, maybe not. Anyway, "harp sponge" takes less time to say.

Those little things at the bottom aren't roots, by the way. They're called rhizoids, and keep the sponge rooted in place.

Now, if only harp sponges were a hundred feet tall, walked on land, and roared: maybe they'd revive good old-fashioned movies like "Them!," "Tarantula," or "Night of the Lepus." The Lemming would say 'they just don't make movies like that any more: but there's "The Thing" (2011). Special effects have changed a bit, and that's another topic.

The article's video video was a bit on the dry side, but the Lemming enjoyed it. Your experience may vary:



Slightly-related posts:

• "First Montauk, Now This: East River 'Monster,' Another Dead - Thing"
  (August 3, 2012)
• "Lilli the Six-Legged Calf"
  (March 30, 2012)
• "And Now, For Something Completely Different: Portable Buildings; and an Octopus Cartoon"
  (March 7, 2012)
• " 'Rapture' and a Rattled Raccoon"
  (May 24, 2011)
• "Heidi the Cross-Eyed Possum"
  (January 12, 2011)

First Montauk, Now This: East River 'Monster,' Another Dead - Thing

"Dead East River 'monster' confounds New Yorkers, animal experts"
Philip Caulfieldn, New York Daily News (July 25, 2012)
"A gnarly, dead carcass snapped by photographer Denise Ginley has the Parks Department claiming it's just a pig, while naysayers are crying 'foul.'...

"...A bloated, pig-like carcass spotted beneath the Brooklyn Bridge over the weekend has spooked New Yorkers buzzing about mutant river 'monsters.'

"Photographer Denise Ginley shot pics of the rotting, sand-covered corpse on Sunday. 'My boyfriend and I were walking along the East River on our way to a farmer's market when we spotted it among some driftwood on a small stretch of sand below the Brooklyn Bridge that you can barely call a beach,' she emailed the Daily News...."

This particular dead critter looks like a pig, sort of: judging from the photos, it's about the right size, has ears that are sort of pig-like. What's at the end of the legs? Maybe not so much:


(Denise Ginley, via New York Daily News, used w/o permission)

"
(Denise Ginley, via New York Daily News, used w/o permission
"Photographer Denise Ginley shot pics of the rotting, sand-covered corpse on Sunday while strolling with her boyfriend along the Manhattan side of the East River."

"
(Denise Ginley, via New York Daily News, used w/o permission
"Photographer Denise Ginley thinks it is odd that the Parks Department so quickly said the creature was a 'discarded cooked pig' and that the department 'threw it out.' "

A Pig: With Hands?!

No, the Lemming does not think that this is a mutant space-alien Elvis impersonator. Maybe a pig's hooves look like that, after being exposed to the elements for long enough.

Or maybe the Parks Department officials are city folks, and never got closer to pigs than a supermarket's meat department.

Or - maybe this is Elvis! (July 30, 2008) Or, not.

"East River Monster Is Either a Raccoon or Dog or Rodent (or Monster)"
Joe Coscarelli, New York (July 26, 2012)

"When the New York City Parks Department tried to tell us that this fat little blob of horror was a pig, we said hell no because we have eyes and our paranoia will not be placated. Instead, we came up with conspiracy theories about chemicals in the East River, offshore animal testing, and the Jurassic Park–style breeding of many more Montauk Monsters. Then, just in case, we asked the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, where a wildlife expert told Daily Intel through a spokesperson that 'the carcass in the picture you provided appears to be a raccoon.' Hmmm. Maybe?

"But the experts do not agree.

" 'Obviously, all of the hair is gone and the carcass is greatly bloated due to decay, so all of the typical body-form clues are absent,' said our source. 'But the overall body appearance, coupled with the hands/feet, look like a raccoon.' The original Montauk Monster also got called a raccoon, but who knows how deep this thing goes) The wildlife people aren't making any promises anyway: 'We cannot say for certain though without examining the carcass in person.' It's too bad the Parks Department 'just threw it out.'..."

So, is the east river monster a drowned dog, a deceased raccoon, a mutant pig, or something else? In the Lemming's considered opinion: maybe.


(Denise Ginley, via New York, used w/o permission)
"...But this doesn't look like a dog paw to us either...." (Joe Coscarelli, New York)

Actually, "pig" seems unlikely. The ears are sort of pig-shaped: but the - paws? Hands?

What's at the far end of the front legs for mammals that don't have hooves is fairly standard hardware: so all that the Lemming will commit to is that the east river monster almost certainly is a mammal, and comes from Earth.

And Now, Something Crazy

On the other hand, it would be so cool if this was the body of an escaped prisoner from a top-secret space alien government black ops undercover mad scientist frankenfood biotech CIA plot.

Involving Elvis.

Related posts:

• Critters!
  • "Chupacabra! Or, Attack of the Giant Chihuahua! Or, Beware of Mutant Raccoon"
    (July 11, 2010)
  • "Montauk Monster is Back: Photo Revealed"
    (May 13, 2009)
  • "Georgia Bigfoot Hoax: Rube Duped by Sophisticated Humor?"
    (August 21, 2008)
  • "Montauk Monster: It's Alive! Three Live Sightings So Far"
    (August 3, 2008)
  • "Montauk Monster: Publicity Stunt by Space Aliens, Implicating USDA's Plum Island?"
    (July 30, 2008)
• Conspiracies?
  • "Mayan Apocalypse Transition: Book a Galactic Cruise; or Take the Cosmic Bike Tour"
    (February 3, 2012)
  • "How to Not Sound Crazy - or - THE PARANOIDS ARE AFTER ME!!!"
    (June 12, 2011)
  • "Nuclear Weapons, Space Aliens, Conspiracy Theories, and Getting a Grip"
    (September 24, 2010)
  • "Why is it So Hard to Find a Comprehensive History of Blotting Paper?"
    (March 2, 2010)
  • "Haiti's Earthquake Caused by - You Guessed it - Yankee Imperialists"
    (January 21, 2010)

Lilli the Six-Legged Calf

"Six-legged Swiss calf uncowed by disability"
Associated Press, via FoxNews.com (March 29, 2012)

"A six-legged calf has defied the odds by thriving despite a vet's prediction at birth that it wouldn't survive.

"Seven-week-old Lilli is now a minor celebrity in her native Switzerland after local media were splashed with images of the calf frolicking across a sunny field...."

Andreas Knutti, the farmer who owns Lilli, said he decided not to euthanize the six-legged critter "because she was 'so full of life.' " Aside from the extra legs, Lilli has a non-standard curve in her spine that apparently means she won't be a "normal milk cow." Just what that means, the AP article didn't say.

"...But Knutti says if the calf stays healthy she'll still be allowed to join the others when they head for their Alpine pastures this summer...."
(Associated Press, via FoxNews.com)

The Lemming will forgo comments about Rudolph the ostracized reindeer. Or getting serious about disabilities, or cattle, or psychological ramifications of dysfunctional peer bonding.

It's Friday, and the Lemming is looking forward to the weekend.

And the Lemming is glad Mr. Knutti let Lilli live.

Related posts:

• "Heidi the Cross-Eyed Possum"
  (January 12, 2011)
• "A Rabbit, a Reindeer Tiara, and a Grim Sentiment"
  (November 20, 2010)
• "Pink Hippo? Don't Worry: I See It, Too"
  (October 2, 2010)
• A Lemur With Huge Dark Eyes"
  (September 9, 2010)
• "Funny, Freakish Critter's Feet: the Photo"
  (June 9, 2010)

And Now, For Something Completely Different: Portable Buildings; and an Octopus Cartoon

"Athletic builds: the architecture of the London 2012 Olympics"
Steve Rose, Culture > Art and design > Architecture, theguardian (UK) (March 5, 2012)

"You've seen the pool, the stadium and the velodrome – now here's the octopus-tentacle shooting range and the multicoloured rubber bridge. Steve Rose looks at the hidden architectural highlights of London 2012


"Olympic octopus … Magma's shooting gallery. Photograph: J.L.Diehl
(via guardian.co.uk, used w/o permission)

"For the first half of the 20th century, architecture featured as an Olympic event. Medals in the 'culture games' were also awarded for sports-related endeavours in the fields of music, painting, literature and even town-planning. But the practice was abandoned after the 1948 games, when the last gold medals for architecture went to an Austrian ski-jump and an athletics centre in Finland...."

There's more, partly about the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Velodrome, Zaha Hadid, and why London in 2012 won't look like Beijing in 2008. Also a refreshing bit of common sense labeled as "sustainable:" a basketball area and shooting venue that event organizers can move around the world. Or to Glasgow.

By far not the worst idea the Lemming's seen.

This Video has Nothing to do with the Olympics

And now, for something completely different: an animated cartoon about two octopuses. Octopi. Octopods. Oh, never mind.

"Octopus cartoon"

elgreco01, YouTube (November 25, 2008)
video, 2:26

Enjoy.Related (?) posts:

• Apocalypse, Olympics, architecture, and all that
  
  • "Mayan Apocalypse Transition: Book a Galactic Cruise; or Take the Cosmic Bike Tour"
    (February 3, 2012)
  • "Olympic Committee Rules for Social Media: Common Sense; or Signs of a Vast Conspiracy of Space Aliens?"
    (June 27, 2011)
  • "Wiggly Buildings and Other Weirdness"
    (September 13, 2010)
  • "Rogers Centre / SkyDome, Toronto, Canada"
    (July 16, 2010)
  • "China Olympics and Algae: Bad News, Good News, Bad News"
    (July 3, 2008)
• Octopi - octopuses - octopods - whatever
  • "A Somewhat Paranoid Look at Cute, Deadly, Animals"
    (February 5, 2010)
  • "Dumbo Octopus: Two Eyes, Eight Tentacles, and Wings"
    (February 1, 2010)
  • "And Now, for Something Completely Different: Animated Octopuses - Octopods - Octopi - More Than One Animated Octopus"
    (November 13, 2009)
  • "The Answer You've Been Waiting For: How Many Arms Does an Octopus Have?"
    (August 16, 2008)
  • "Forget Henry the Eighth: Meet Henry the Hexapus"
    (March 4, 2008)

Brainless Blobs Invade Hawaii! - Or - Attack of the Ctenophores!

"Strange jellyfish-like creatures cloud Hanauma Bay"
Kathy Muneno, KOHN2 (March 3, 2012)

"A few weeks ago at Hanauma Bay, a group of swimmers ran into a group strange looking jellyfish.

"Called a ctenophore, it may not look menacing, but a swimmer said there were thousands - so many, they had to get out of the water.

" 'I was not very surprised, it's a very rare event and those people who got to see them were actually very lucky people because they're really harmless and it's a rare sight,' said Mark Martindale, a UH professor and ctenophora expert.

"That's right, although swimmers said they felt like these animals stung them, they are harmless.

" 'They do not sting, they have tentacles but instead of having stinging cells like the Medusi jellyfish that most people are familiar with, these animals use their tentacles to stick to the prey and then they bring them to their mouth, so yeah they're perfectly harmless,' Martindale said.

" 'These aren't jellyfish at all but they certainly look the part,' said UH professor Angel Yanagihara.

"But they can harm some environments, like when they depleted fish stocks in the Black Sea...."

Not to worry, apparently: the ctenophores aren't likely to eat Hawaii. The places where the voracious little predators caused problems are smallish bodies of water. The Pacific Ocean - isn't.

The hand-sized blobs of appetite showing up in Hanauma Bay may have something to do with the dropoff near the bay's mouth. Or maybe something else was going on. That's what the Lemming gathered from the article, anyway.

One more thing - a UH professor and ctenophora expert Mark Martindale says the critters are "extremely important" because "they're the most ancient example of multi-cellular animals. They've been around longer than any fish." Not that the individuals at Hanauma Bay are upwards of 488,300,000 years old. Mark Martindale probably meant that critters that looked like ctenophores have been around for something like half of a billion years.

Brainless Blobs

Ctenophores - mercifully - have another name. One that's easier to pronounce: comb jellies. Oddly, there don't seem to be brush jams, although the Lemming is familiar with door jams, and that's another topic.

Ctenophores are a sort of minimal animal, getting by with no brain: just a 'nerve net,' a sort of cobweb of nerves that runs through the critter. There's a gag or two involving elections, committees, or opinion polls, lurking in that factoid: but they eluded the Lemming. The gags, that is.

Other posts about critters:

• Wet
  • "Really Big Amphipod: 11 Inches Long"
    (February 13, 2012)
  • "Lemming Tracks: Inflatable Sharks? Swell!"
    (June 28, 2011)
  • "Save the - Goldfish?!"
    (June 16, 2011)
  • "Animals That Don't Need Oxygen - It Gets Weirder"
    (April 9, 2010)
  • "Dumbo Octopus: Two Eyes, Eight Tentacles, and Wings"
    (February 1, 2010)
• Dry
  • "Radioactive Pigs Attack Germany - No, Really"
    (August 4, 2010)
  • "Tarantula Feet, Silk, and Research"
    (May 20, 2011)
  • "Bradford's Giant Rat? Coypu? If You Meet One: Does the Name Matter?"
    (August 20, 2010)
  • "The Aye-Aye: Very Strange Primates In Madagascar"
    (January 7, 2010)
  • "Montauk Monster is Back: Photo Revealed"
    (May 13, 2009)
• Cute
  • "Heidi the Cross-Eyed Possum"
    (January 12, 2011)
  • "Funny, Freakish Critter's Feet: the Photo"
    (June 9, 2010)
  • "Cute: Strange, but Cute"
    (May 20, 2010)
  • "Oh, Look: It's a Cute - - - Thing"
    (May 8, 2010)
  • "Don't Worry: I See It, Too"
    (March 8, 2010)

More:

• "Ctenophora"
  Wikipedia
• "Ctenophores"
  C. E. Mills, University of Washington
• "Introduction to Ctenophora"
  UCMP (University of California Museum of Paleontology, Berkeley)
• "Geologic time scale"
  • "Ordovician"
  UCMP (University of California Museum of Paleontology, Berkeley)

Really Big Amphipod: 11 Inches Long

"Terrifying giant crustaceans found in deep sea"
Andrea Mustain, LiveScience, via FoxNews.com (February 3, 2012)

"Scientists on an expedition to sample a deep-sea trench got a surprise when their traps brought back seven giant crustaceans glimpsed only a handful of times in human history.

"The 'supergiant' amphipods are more than 20 times larger than their typical crustacean relatives, which are generally less than a half-inch (1 centimeter) long, and thrive in lakes and oceans around the world. They are sometimes called the 'insects of the sea.'

" 'We pulled up the trap, and lying among the fish were these absolutely massive amphipods, and there was no inkling whatsoever that these things should be there,' said Alan Jamieson, a lecturer at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, and leader of the expedition that turned up the fantastical creatures in November 2011...."


(From Oceanlab, via FoxNews, used w/o permission.)
"An elusive supergiant amphipod, recently plucked from the deep sea. (Oceanlab, University of Aberdeen, UK)"

Oh, wow. That's a big bug. Critter. Amphipod.

It's big, for something with an exoskeleton. Even back in the good old days, when some dragonflies had a two-foot wingspan, that's not small.

Things like this were first discovered in 1899, the article says. That's when someone wrote about them, anyway. They haven't been seen much since: no great surprise, considering where these critters live.

Wow: that's a big critter.

Not-entirely-unrelated posts:

• "Hellgrammite: A Lake, a Character, and a - Thing"
  (February 27, 2011)
• "Really Big Dragonflies: Oxygen's What Does It"
  (November 3, 2010)
• "Barnacles, Brains, and Staying Awake"
  (February 13, 2010)
• "The Coconut Crab: No, It's Not From a Science Fiction Movie"
  (September 25, 2009)
• "Hurdia Victoria: Cambrian Supercritter of the Burgess Shale"
  (March 20, 2009)

From the Department of Unintended Consequences: One Dead Rhino

It looked so good on paper: put poison in a rare rhinoceros, to discourage poachers.

Just one problem: now the rhino is dead. It wasn't the poison, though.

Oops!

"Bungled conservation effort kills South African rhino"
Reuters (February 9, 2012)

"A group of animal conservationists in South Africa accidentally killed a rhinoceros they were attempting to make safe from poachers in a botched public relations event.

"Spencer the rhino went into convulsions and died after he was shot with a tranquilizer dart in front of a crush of TV cameras and photographers who had been invited to document an operation to insert a poison capsule into his horn....

"...'The rhino had an unfortunate reaction to the anesthesia,' Rhino Rescue Project spokeswoman Lorinda Hern said. 'Every time you dart a rhino, you take a risk that the rhino might not wake up and unfortunately today was one of those days.'

"Conservation groups insert poison capsules into the horns of rhinos, which release poison into the horn when it is removed from the animal and are meant to render the horn value-less for hunters seeking to sell it on for use in traditional medicine...."

Maybe it makes sense to spike a rare rhino's horn. Maybe:

• The odds of killing the rhino are fairly low
• Most poachers will
  • Know about the poison pill
  • Care about selling poisoned rhino horn
• Rhino horn buyers will
  • Know about the poison pill
  • Care about buying poisoned rhino horn

That's a lot of 'maybes.'

In the Lemming's opinion, folks running the Rhino Rescue Project are putting a lot of faith in the humanitarian impulses of poachers, and the ethical standards of drug smugglers dealers in illegal animal parts.

Living in the Real World

In an ideal world, people wouldn't put rat poo in peanut butter, or sell toxic toys. But this isn't an ideal world:

• "Peanut Peril: Remembering"
  (February 26, 2009)
• "Lots of Lead and Cadmium in Kids' Tableware: Spiffy"
  (November 22, 2010)
• "China: Toxic Toys and Dubious Dumplings Aren't Signs of Terrorism"
  Another War-on-Terror Blog (January 30, 2008)

So what's the big deal about rhinoceros horn? Quite a few folks seem convinced that the stuff cures just about everything:

• "Rhino horn: All myth, no medicine"
  David Braun, National Geographic (July 7, 2010)

Sort of like snake oil: except that a (genuinely) endangered species might go extinct.

The Lemming hopes that enough folks in Asia will take another look at their equivalent of high-octane patent medicines: and decide to stop contributing to the extinction of an odd sort of critter.

Or - here's an idea - maybe someone in South Africa will come up with a marketable substitute for rhino horn. The country raises beef, poultry, and sheep - apparently for local consumption. Maybe byproducts that aren't getting used now, like bone, could be turned into an exportable commodity.

Or maybe the Lemming's too optimistic, or pessimistic, about marketing and gullibility. And that's another topic.

Related (?) posts:

• "New York City, Stray Cats, Shag, and Sense"
  (December 28, 2011)
• "Save the - Goldfish?!"
  (June 16, 2011)
• "February 14th: Horned Lizard Day"
  (February 11, 2011)
• "Radioactive Pigs Attack Germany - No, Really"
  (August 4, 2010)
• "Mice Feel Pain (We knew That) - And Show it Like We do ("No One" Knew That)"
  (May 11, 2010)

New York City, Stray Cats, Shag, and Sense

"Architects Design Homes for NYC's Stray Cats"
Carolina Worrell, ENR New York, via Architectural Record (December 27, 2011)

"Area architects may not have had to claw their way in but they recently put their design and engineering skills to the test on an animal-rescue mission to design warm, weatherproof, portable and safe shelters for New York City's stray cats. The designers volunteered their time and resources to design and build the shelters for the second annual Architects for Animals competition, part of the non-profit Mayor's Alliance for New York City's Animals.

"There are more than 10,000 stray cats in New York City, says Co Adaptive Architecture, a Brooklyn-based design firm that supports socially and environmentally beneficial work for non-profit organizations...."

At that point, the Lemming didn't know what to expect. Architects have been known to do bizarre things when let off the leash. Add heady buzzwords like "environmentally beneficial" and "non-profit," and there's no telling what could happen.

Back to the article.

"...Co Adaptive teamed with architect Kathryn Walton, founder of the non-profit The American Street Cat, Inc., to win this year's competition with a shelter that includes a data-monitoring device. The shelter, which is constructed of recycled and donated materials, is equipped with a pressure sensor, LED light, and a radio transmitter that lights up when occupied and sends information to a base station that posts the weight of the cat and the duration of its stay on the web in real time.

" 'Since one base station can support hundreds of shelters within a one-mile radius, multiple shelters located within multiple cat colonies can provide useful data for caretakers and certified trap-neuter-return (TNR) workers,' Co Adaptive says. The firm hopes that the shelter will ultimately be used 'to expedite efforts to minimize the overpopulation problem.'..."

Okay: collecting data, and managing the city's stray cat population in what seems to be a humane way, makes sense. So far, so good.

Some of the architects lived down to the Lemming's expectations. There's 'The Shag,' that looks like a refugee from a '70s pet store. The Lemming suspects that the architect may have hoped that a pet supply company would take notice: nothing wrong with that, by itself, but probably not the most efficient way to deal with New York City's stray cats.


(from Architectural Record, used w/o permission)
"A design by RMJM - Photo by Dana Edelson"

Some of the other entries looked nice, and might have been easier to mass-produce than they seem to be. But the Lemming thinks those designs were more an exercise in aesthetics and economics. Nothing wrong with that: but didn't stray cats come up in the discussion, somewhere?

Still. Some of the entries looked pretty good.


(from Architectural Record, used w/o permission)
"A design by Gage Clemenceau - Photo by Dana Edelson"

Then there's the "^{Cat S}H3^elter," by H3 Hardy. It's not what most folks might want in their living room, but a design that involves mailing tubes should be 'environmentally beneficial.' Recycling and all that.

Not a bad idea. Not bad at all. In the Lemming's opinion.


(from Architectural Record, used w/o permission)
"The shelter designed by H3 Hardy was given to CSM Foundation. Here, a stray cat uses the outdoor shelter. Photo by Dana Edelson"

Almost-related posts:

• "Wiggly Buildings and Other Weirdness"
  (September 13, 2010)
• "Goodbye McMansion, Hello Common Sense?"
  (August 30, 2010)
• "Civic Park in Los Angeles: Designers, Dozens of Officials and a $56,000,000 Budget"
  (July 14, 2010)
• "Seven Very Strange-Looking Houses"
  (August 26, 2009)
• "That's One Pink House!"
  (June 25, 2009)

Disapproving Rabbits, the Next Generation: Dougal

"Dougal "
Disapproving Rabbits (December 19, 2011)

"Here's an update on Dougal: he's getting more used to us, though his first instinct is still to bolt into his cardboard box. He's coming out more often, mostly to run laps (as seen in the video below)...."

The Lemming wondered how long the folks who bring us Disapproving Rabbits would remain rabbitless. They lost Cinnamon, that ancient and leporine bulwark of disapproval, back in June.

Here's their account of how Dougal entered their lives. Part of it, anyway:

"Dougal"
Disapproving Rabbits (December 9, 2011)

"We were heading out of town on a long drive, talking about Christmas, when Sharon said that she was ready to get another rabbit. She missed the scampering sounds, the chewing, and "that good rabbit smell." I agreed. We'd been putting it off because our schedules had been full of work and travel, but now, oddly, things were calming down in December.

"About a minute later I got a message from my friend Laurie, who volunteers at the Humane Society. They had a rabbit, she wrote, that she thought would be perfect for us. We were about five miles away at the time. So we made a detour.

"He was a big boy: about a year old and seven pounds. Super skittish when we got him into the familiarization room, but Laurie told us that he was a stray who was adopted and then returned, but once he calmed down...."

There's quite a bit more text than usual in that Disapproving Rabbits post: understandably, since it was a narrative of Dougal's integration into a new household. The Lemming enjoyed reading about Dougal, acclimatization, and getting photos of a skittish rabbit. But then, the Lemming has a soft spot for tales that end with "...it's good to have a rabbit in the house."

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Sic Transit Gloria Bunny - Cinnamon, of Disapproving Rabbits"
  (June 22, 2011)
• "Rabbit, Snow: Disapproval"
  (December 1, 2010)
• "Your Daily Adult Requirement of Cute: One Little Rabbit, Then Two"
  (October 5, 2010)
• "Rabbit Philosophizing"
  (May 13, 2010)
• "And Now, the Recommended Daily Adult Requirement of Cute"
  (March 25, 2010)

Lemming Tracks: Inflatable Sharks? Swell!

"Inflatable Shark Among 300 New Species Discovered in Philippines"
Charles Q. Choi, LiveScience (June 27, 2011)

"A treasure trove of hundreds of new species may have been discovered in the Philippines, including a bizarre sea star that feeds exclusively on sunken driftwood and a deep-sea, shrimp-eating shark that swells up to scare off other predators.

"Scientists braved leeches and a host of venomous creatures from the mountains to the sea to uncover more than 300 species that are likely new to science. These findings include dozens of new insects and spiders, more than 50 colorful new sea slugs and a number of deep-sea armored corals 'which protect themselves against predatory nibbles from fish by growing large, spiky plates,' said researcher Terrence Gosliner, dean of science and research collections at the California Academy of Sciences and leader of the 2011 Philippine Biodiversity Expedition....

"...All these new findings help support the idea that the Philippines 'is one of the hottest of the hotspots for diverse and threatened life on Earth,' Gosliner said. 'We found new species during nearly every dive and hike as we surveyed the country's reefs, rainforests and the ocean floor.' [10 Species You Can Kiss Goodbye]..."

'You got an inflatable what?!!'



Now that the Lemming's got that out of his apathetic system, a micro-review of the LiveScience article.

What We Know, and What We Know that We don't Know - Yet

First, kudos for writing "likely new to science." Some of the 'new' critters may have been spotted, evaluated, and recorded before - but not all that well-known. Someday, maybe, there'll be some nth-generation successor to the Internet that can search just about all records ever made by anybody, anywhere - fast. But the Lemming's not holding his breath, waiting for it.

The same facts could be reported as Endangered Species Discovered in Philippines - with a sidebar about Save the Armored Coral, a frightfully earnest bunch that's raising funds in a desperate race to protect the critters from something. Probably climate change. Global warming seems to be currently démodé.

The Lemming - Against Biodiversity?

If you've read this blog before, you may realize that the Lemming is apathetic only in a snarky sense of the word. It's the sort of apathy that doesn't necessarily go ballistic over the crisis du jure.

Now, about biodiversity and all that.

It is the Lemming's opinion that kittens are cute. The Lemming also thinks that breathing exhaust fumes is a bad idea.

Earth has been the Lemming's home for decades - and so the Lemming has a very personal interest in what happens to life on this planet.

The Lemming is also aware that one of the few constants on this planet for the last few billion years has been change. There's a reason you won't find recipes calling for fresh trilobite - and the Lemming's used that one before:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"
  (September 26, 2009)

It's probably a mistake to assume that Earth's ecosystems were exactly right at one time, and any that deviation from that 'normal' setting is a planetary catastrophe of epic proportions - and may even result in the other party getting a majority in Congress. Not that there was anything 'wrong' with conditions in, say:

• 1850
• 1491
• 1065
• 454
• Whenever

But thinking that Earth's climate in 454 was okay does not necessarily mean that any change from that 'normal' is a problem.

Change may happen easily - whether we want it to or not - but that doesn't make living with change easy.

The trick, in the Lemming's opinion, is to tell the difference between change that might cause practical problems: and change that is not a disaster of global proportions.

"Biodiversity:" At Least Five Syllables Long

Is "biodiversity" important? Probably. Possibly. Could be. Quite a few folks think so, anyway.

Clearly, biodiversity decreases when the number of species on Earth goes down.¹

'Save the Cockroach??'

About that "[10 Species You Can Kiss Goodbye]" - the Lemming isn't happy with the thought that every species that ever was isn't thriving right now? Wait a minute - let's think about that.

If change didn't happen - or had stopped at some point - that might mean that we'd have forests of lycophytes, and have to worry about a pederpes getting into the garden. Assuming that we'd be here, of course.

It'd be nice if the Sumatran rhinoceros, black-footed ferret, and Sumatran orangutan, weren't - apparently - on their way to being extinct. On the other hand, this may not presage a replay of the Permian-Triassic extinction even - or ever The End Of Civilization As We Know It.

Still, things don't look good for the Sumatran rhinoceros.

When we hear about cockroaches dying by the bushel, pigeons no longer gracing civic monuments, and rats being conspicuous by their absence? Then the Lemming will think there's cause for concern.

Ever notice how the Tasmanian devil isn't often mentioned in appeals to 'save the endangered [cuddlesome critter]?' Despite devil facial tumour disease ravaging the species? "...At present the population has dwindled 70% since 1996. Numbers as of 2010 show an 80% rate of infection throughout the population...." The good news is that six (6) females seem to be resistant to the disease. There's a captive-breeding program that may save the species. (Wikipedia)

Assumptions and an Apathetic Lemming

There's a time and place for intense earnestness. Sally Struthers achieved a kind of fame in the marketing world for her effectiveness at a particular sort of fundraising. That is not a criticism. The actress could emote very well - and had by that time achieved fame for her role in All in the Family. It's hard to argue with success - although some have tried.

And that's another topic.

In a world where the American bison and spotted owl were supposed to go extinct - and didn't; and we didn't mostly die in food riots that didn't happen; the Lemming thinks that there can be a difference between assumptions and reality. And that's yet another topic. Topics.

Related (no - really) posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: Hey! Where'd Sunday Go?!"
  (June 27, 2011)
• "Save the - Goldfish?!"
  (June 16, 2011)
• "Hellgrammite: A Lake, a Character, and a - Thing"
  (February 27, 2011)
• "Beware Warmonger Imperialist Space Aliens!?"
  (January 11, 2011)
• "Glowing Cancer Test From the Crystal Jellyfish: Maybe"
  (November 2, 2010)

---

¹ Think about it - - -.

Sic Transit Gloria Bunny - Cinnamon, of Disapproving Rabbits

"Cinnamon"
Disapproving Rabbits (June 13, 2011)

"Hello all.

"It is with deep sadness that Sharon and I tell you that Cinnamon has passed away. She had a wonderful life of some 13 years.

"As you can imagine, this is an emotional time for us. We're going to take a break from the website for a week...."

Disapproving Rabbits is back now - with "All disapproval, all the time." Today's post reads: "You're home? But... Dead Man's Curve! The brake line!" ("Cadbury,"Scott & Joanna, via Disapproving Rabbits (June 22, 2011))

Cinnamon's still with the blog, in a way: the posts are still "Disapproved of by Cinnamon."

The Lemming will let some of the 378 comments on Disapproving Rabbits' June 13, 2011, post speak for the Lemming:

"My sympathies on your loss. Thank you for sharing Cinnamon with us -- she was the best disapprover there was."
(BookGeekGrrl)

"Oh no :(
"we're so sorry to hear this....but wow, 13 years! She had a bunderfully long life and was so very loved by you and by all of us...bunny prayers to you and your family!"
(funnybunnykp)

"I'm sorry for your loss. Over the years that you have this blog, I've enjoyed seeing Cinnamon do her thing.

"I hope this won't mean the end of Disapproving Rabbits because I love this blog."
(Tilia)

Related posts:

• "A Rabbit, Pumpkin, and Thanksgiving"
  (November 25, 2010)
• "A Rabbit, a Reindeer Tiara, and a Grim Sentiment"
  (November 20, 2010)
• "Bespectacled Rabbit and Keyboard"
  (August 17, 2010)
• "And Now, for Something Completely Different: An Unhappy Rabbit?"
  (April 5, 2010)
• "Rabbit Philosophizing"
  (May 13, 2010)

Save the - Goldfish?!

"San Francisco Wants to Ban Goldfish to Prevent Their 'Inhumane Suffering' "
Todd Starnes, FoxNews.com (June 16, 2011)

"The San Francisco Animal Control and Welfare Commission wants to take away your goldfish, proposing a bill that would also include a renewed ban on pets like puppies, kittens and hamsters.

"The proposed ban is meant to discourage 'impulse buys' of pets that sometimes end up at shelters, said commission member Philip Gerrie....

Before anybody has a stroke, please note that the Lemming thinks:

• Animals should not be mistreated
• Pet owners have responsibilities
• Kittens and puppies grow into cats and dogs
• Free Willy was a fun movie

The Lemming also thinks that even elected officials should think before acting.

Is impulsively buying a kitten or puppy - or a baby chick - a bad thing to do? Not, in the Lemming's opinion, necessarily. In principle, it's possible for someone who knows about litter boxes and leash laws to suddenly decide that it'd be nice to have a kitten around - and a dozen years later still be taking care of the long-since-grown-up cat.

The Lemming also realizes that not everybody who grabs a cute little ball of fur and fangs really understands what having a pet means.

That's the real world, now, back to the article:

Swim Free, as Free as the Wind Blows - - -

"...He [commission member Philip Gerrie] said goldfish, guppies and other tropical fish were added to the proposed ban because of what he called the 'inhumane suffering of fish' and the way the fish are harvested.

" 'It causes animal suffering,' Gerrie told Fox News Radio. 'Whole reefs and ecosystems are being exploited for whatever might be marketable or sellable.'

"The Board of Supervisors considered a similar ban last year that would have included dogs, cats, hamsters, mice, rats and guinea pigs – but not fish. That proposed ban was tabled last August. The supervisor said they were going to reconsider it in January of this year – but did not.

"The proposed fish ban has local pet store owners up in arms...."

There's a lot going on in those four paragraphs.

Fish Really do Have Feelings - Sort of

About the "inhumane suffering of fish?" That may not be as crazy as it sounds. Fish are animals with a central nervous system that doesn't work all that differently from ours.¹

On the other hand, it's anyone's guess whether or not the San Francisco Board of Supervisors is aware that domestic goldfish are just that - domestic. There are no prides of Lionhead Goldfish swimming free along the sunlit shores of some exotic island.

Commercial exploitation of exotic animals, that's something else.

Remember how groovy "zero tolerance" must have seemed at the time? And that isn't quite another topic.

By the way, here's an entirely different sort of commercial goldfish:

"Goldfish Commercial"

link2772, YouTube (December 8, 2006)
video, 0:31

Save the Endangered - - - Rats?!

Last year's efforts to save San Francisco's (pet) rats may not have been the result of someone assuming that greedy pet store owners recklessly disturbed delicate ecosystems in the city's dumpsters and sewer system, harvesting rats for the pet trade. Still, you never know.

Again - rats have central nervous systems. They're not all that different from mice - and the Lemming's been over this before:

• "Mice Feel Pain (We knew That) - And Show it Like We do ('No One' Knew That)"
  (May 11, 2010)

In the Lemming's considered opinion: elected officials should get out of the office more often, and see what it's like on the planet the rest of us call home. So, again in the Lemming's opinion, should quite a few scientists.

And that is another topic.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Apathy is Rampant, But Who Cares? - The Sequel"
  (February 7, 2011)
• "Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide Now! Or, Not"
  (January 3, 2011)
• "John Muir: 'Hitched to Everything Else in the Universe' "
  (October 17, 2010)
• "San Diego Zoo on Birds, Some of Which are - What Else? - Endangered"
  (September 2, 2010)
• "Attack of the Mutant Eucalyptus Trees!"
  (June 13, 2010)

¹ Background (pretty boring):

• "Mechanoreceptive and Nociceptive Responses in the Central Nervous System of Goldfish (Carassius auratus) and Trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)"
  Science Direct (September 2005)

'Rapture' and a Rattled Raccoon

"That's a Wrap, Sure"
Not That Mike The Other Mike, Cute Overload (May 22, 2011 )

"Wait… we're all still here? N-nothing happened?"


(Peter/Not That Mike The Other Mike, via Cute Overload, used w/o permission)

"No earthquakes? No torrents of fire? No express elevator to Heaven?..."

"...Sender-inner Peter notes that he thought he was staking out an owl's nest, but this raccoon appeared instead. Perhaps the owl just (pause for effect) disappeared."

The Cute Overload post has three more photos - each slightly larger than this copy. You'll probably want to read the mouse-over test, too.

The Lemming thought this sequence of photos, the captions - and the 'alt' text - were funny. Your experience may vary, of course.

Not-completely-unrelated posts:

• "Gerbils Anonymous: Cute Photos, Common-Sense Advice"
  (April 13, 2011)
• "Armadillo!"
  (December 18, 2010)
• "A Rabbit, a Reindeer Tiara, and a Grim Sentiment"
  (November 20, 2010)
• "Pygmy Jerboa: A Tiny Head with Feet"
  (June 28, 2010)
• "Racoons and Ice Cream"
  (July 1, 2009)

---

Seriously, though: The Lemming realizes that a fair number of folks in America believed Mr. Camping, the radio preacher who made the latest 'Rapture' prediction. Some of them spent money like there was no tomorrow - and May 22, 2011, came anyway. That's not funny.

The Cute Overload photos and captions? That, for the Lemming, is funny.

Why does the Lemming react this way to yet one more 'End Times prophecy' not coming out as-advertised? Maybe these posts in another blog by the Lemming will explain:

• "Particular Judgment, Last Judgment, and Weekend Grilling"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (May 22, 2011)
• "Last Judgment: Attendance Mandatory"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (May 21, 2011)
  Particularly
  • Footnote 2

Or, maybe not.

Tarantula Feet, Silk, and Research

"Tarantulas Shoot Silk From Their Feet, Researchers Find"
FoxNews.com (May 18, 2011)

"Talk about fancy footwork!

"British researchers have discovered that adult tarantulas can climb sheer walls by shooting strands of silk from their feet -- enabling the hefty arachnids to save themselves should they risk falling from a height. Tarantulas, it turns out, are actually quite fragile.

" 'The animals are very delicate. They wouldn't survive a fall from any height,' explained Claire Rind from the University of Newcastle in the U.K. Teaming up with undergraduate Luke Birkett, Rind made the surprising discovery using three ground-dwelling Chilean rose tarantulas.

"Gently placing one of the animals in a very clean aquarium with microscope slides on the floor, the duo cautiously upended the aquarium to see if the tarantula could hang on...."

It did.

It wasn't supposed to, but it did.

Apparently folks 'knew' that tarantulas couldn't hold on to a vertical surface: but the tarantula in the tank wasn't quite so well-informed. So to speak.

Even a gentle shake didn't dislodge the outsized spider. It slipped a little, but found footing again.

Back to that article.

"...Looking at the glass by eye, Rind couldn't see anything, but when she and Birkett looked closely under a microscope, they found minute threads of silk where the spider had stood before slipping...."

Long story made short, moults - the cast-off exoskeleton of Fluffy the tarantula - and scanning electron microscopy showed tiny, reinforced, silk spigots on the spider's feet. Quite a few of them.

Which explained how Fluffy got little threads of silk tying her feet to the glass.

It's possible that not all tarantulas spin silk from their feet. But since the three species checked by the researchers all do, and aren't very closely related: it looks like foot-silk may be a 'tarantula' trait.

All of which won't help you find a shorter route to work, make your teeth whiter, or find you a successful and rewarding career. But the Lemming thinks this sort of thing is fascinating.

The Lemming also thinks it's noteworthy that these British researchers decided to see whether or not tarantulas could hold on to a vertical glass surface. Instead of reading what an 'expert' said.

And that's another topic.

Finally, if you check the tags for this post you'll find "insects," and "animals." Spiders aren't insects, but this blog has a whole lot of tags already, and I'm not going to start a new "arachnid" one.

Spiders are animals, though: although many folks who speak the same dialect of English as the Lemming mean "mammal" when they say "animal." Which has the same number of letters. And most of the same letters. It's the "i" and "n" that sets "animal" apart.

Then there are words like eukaryotic: and that is yet another topic.

Not-completely-unrelated posts:

• "Hellgrammite: A Lake, a Character, and a - Thing"
  (February 27, 2011)
• "'Terribly Hairy Fly' of Kenya: 'Like a Spider With Hairy Legs'"
  (December 11, 2010)
• "Really Big Dragonflies: Oxygen's What Does It"
  (November 3, 2010)
• "Spiders, Arachnophobia, Crabs, and a Video"
  (November 21, 2009)
• "Trilobites, Arthropods, Evolution, and Why Mothra Isn't Real"
  (October 17, 2009)