Boo Boo the Bear III

Yet more news on Boo Boo the poor bear cub, although he may not be very unlucky much longer!

Boo Boo was found to never have been exposed to rabies, so he has been found a new home: the St. Louis Zoo!

To anyone not from St. Louis, the St. Louis Zoo is one of the best zoos in the world. Animals are in big enclosures meant to mimic their natural habitat with plenty of plants and other animals, and taken good care of by zookeepers. Boo Boo will have a good life there, safe from terrible people like Cindy Farmer. Also, he might be released back into the wild because, thanks in part to Gerald Durrell, zoos can help animals (especially orphans like Boo Boo) to learn to live in the wild.

Actually, I would love to live in the St. Louis Zoo.

And the admission is free, so stop by to wish Boo Boo good luck!

Boo Boo! (This is actually while he is still at Wash-U.)
(courtesy of the Wall Street Journal)

Boo Boo the Bear II

Boo Boo will not be euthanized! The Conservation Department found a way to trace back his origins to the point that they can figure out whether or not he has been exposed to rabies. I'd love to say my efforts helped Boo Boo, but I doubt it, although maybe this shows that if you try hard enough to find another way, you will. It might have seemed simplest to euthanize Boo Boo, but they were able to find another way.

Boo Boo in the hands of an animal shelter.
(Courtesy of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch)

Still, BOYCOTT CINDY'S PETTING ZOO!!! An inspector was sent there to investigate, and this was a REPEAT VIOLATION. Usually, petting zoos only have to be inspected about once a year, but this was the sixth time this year that they had to send an inspector to Cindy's. In the past, they have found sharp wires sticking out at the eye level of rabbits, pigs sitting for weeks in their own waste, water bowls with thick black-brown sludge, animals kept in close to pitch black rooms, jagged metal on cages, expired vaccinations, and, once, a goat stuck inside a feeder, its entire body weight resting on 2 wires, and the owner, Cindy Farmer, seemingly oblivious.

This is not OK! Never give this evil woman business!

However, thank God that Boo Boo was spared. If he is found rabies-less, they will find a better home for him.

Boo Boo the Bear

Washington University recently hired Cindy's Petting Zoo to help take stress off students during finals. They made an agreement that the petting zoo was ONLY TO BRING DOMESTICATED FARM ANIMALS. Surprise, surprise, they show up with a bear cub.

Boo Boo in a student's arms.
(courtesy of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch)

Boo Boo, a 3-month-old bear cub, whose mother was most likely killed in order to obtain him for the petting zoo, nipped a couple of students because he is still teething. After finding out that Boo Boo was taken out of the wild, Wash-U told all the students who had been nipped to report it to the Student Health Services because Boo Boo might have rabies. If I went to Wash-U, this would certainly be taking a lot of stress off of me!

Because animals born in the wild might not show rabies symptoms, it was decided that Boo Boo would have to be euthanized in order to conduct tests to determine whether or not the students should seek medical treatment. The date for the euthanasia is yet to be set.

Boo Boo did nothing wrong! He was an untrained bear taken away from his family and his home by a cruel petting zoo owner. He should not have to die! Boycott Cindy's Petting Zoo until they re-look this ghastly felony! Write to a politician! We must do something about this, and quickly, to save an innocent cub from a terrible fate!

Marine Toad Quiz

If you ask a first-grader what her favorite animal is and she says "marine toad," you will probably think she is either unstable or reading out of an encyclopaedia. Most people who made the mistake of asking me this when I was seven were expecting something more along the lines of "dog" or "giraffe."

But I said marine toad, and there are many interesting things about this species that make it a good first-grade muse. Test your knowledge of marine toads by using the quiz I created below.

1) Marine toads are:

    A)diurnal
    B)nocturnal
    C)crepuscular
    D)always awake

2) If attacked, the marine toad will secrete venom from glands

    A)on its tongue
    B)all over its skin
    C)on its toes
    D)on its shoulders

3) This venom can kill in as quickly as

    A)15 minutes
    B)half an hour
    C)2 hours
    D)24 hours

4) The marine toad's diet includes

    A)fish
    B)snakes
    C)birds
    D)all of the above

5) Each egg clutch contains

    A)1 egg
    B)5-10 eggs
    C)about 20,000 eggs
    D)about 1 million eggs

6) The marine toad was deliberately introduced into some countries to control the populations of insects that are destroying

    A)roses
    B)corn
    C)sugar cane
    D)orchids

7) The marine toad is naturally found in

    A)North America and parts of Northern Russia
    B)every continent except Antarctica and South America
    C)Madagascar and parts of Southern Africa
    D)Central and South America

8) The marine toad is
    A)highly adaptable because it will eat almost anything
    B)highly adaptable because it changes color like a chameleon
    C)very bad at adapting because many species prey on it
    D)very bad at adapting because, unlike many toads, it cannot swim

The Undead Are Coming!

The last edition of The New York Times Magazine featured an eight-page article about bringing extinct species back to life. I've posted a link here: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/02/magazine/the-mammoth-cometh.html?_r=0.

I honestly was going to read it, but I don't really have the time or motivation to read an eight-page article, so after the first 3 pages, I got distracted and started doing something else. I did, however, get a summary from my father, and I kind of got the idea from what I did read. (I just lost all credibility on this topic, didn't I?)

Basically, this guy wanted to use DNA from taxidermied passenger pigeons in museums. Foolproof plan, right? He conveniently overlooks the fact that some strands of DNA would be dead because the passenger pigeons are so old and DNA from bacteria could get mixed in. Somebody else, whose passion seems to be not for passenger pigeons but ecological unrest, wanted to bring back mammoths. Yes. MAMMOTHS. He figures mammoths will live in the Arctic, eat grasses, and promote growth of the Arctic tundra.

What they give as the biggest reason this is a good idea? I quote, "it would be really cool." Now, I have never, in my almost 14 years of existence, a better reason to start a project that has the potential to destroy all the ecosystems on Earth. Well, of course it would be cool, excuse me for not realizing that, after all, doesn't all life on Earth exist purely for Stewart Brand's amusement?

I agree with them that humans have done terrible things to the planet's life. A single flock of passenger pigeons used to black out the Sun for hours when it flew by. There were billions of passenger pigeons only a few years before its extinction in 1914. But we need to move on. A valid concern mentioned in the article is that this "cool" project could halt conservation efforts because if you can bring back species so easily, why try to save them? If you have to animate dead animals and use laboratory tools to bring them back, I think that is going too far. That is not what we need right now. I also see a huge ethical problem with this, similar to people's concerns about cloning. I don't think it is fair to either the animal whose DNA you are taking nor the animal you create. Everybody has a right to die. I wouldn't want to be brought back. I want to die.

Also, how far are you willing to go? Bringing back passenger pigeons is one thing. Mammoths are quite another. This could easily get headed down the wrong track. Sure, it would be cool to see a T-rex. That doesn't mean we should bring one to 2014. Have you ever seen Jurassic Park? That is supposed to be a warning. Stop now!

I'm Not Late, I'm Squirrel-like

Squirrels are a very successful species. Nobody can argue with that. They are found on every continent except Australia and Antarctica. They can live in forests and woodlands, but also manage to get along just fine in cities and suburbs. Squirrels are on their way to taking over the world.

Why do we not value "squirrel-like" qualities, then? Thousands of oak trees a year (seriously— thousands!) grow because a squirrel has forgotten which tree he or she has hidden acorns under, and therefore leaves the acorns to start a forest. A human forgets car keys, or a math folder, or money? Out of luck! Be responsible! What were you thinking? Um, maybe that squirrels do it and it has served them just fine!

Squirrels also have no sense of property. This tree, that tree, your attic, who cares? A human goes walking into a strangers house unexpectedly? Well, thanks to our liberal gun laws, that might be the last time they ever trespass.

When Europeans first came to America, the Native Americans didn't believe in owning land either. As Pocahontas puts it, "You think the Earth's a dead thing you can claim." Land does not belong to anyone. Just look at the squirrels.

If we all took after squirrels, I can think of so many problems that would just go away. The hell with organization! Plant a tree.

The Great Escape

There are two main theories as to why there are no snakes in Ireland.

The first is that St. Patrick banished them all.

The second is that during the last Ice Age, there was a land bridge connecting France and England and another connecting Ireland and Scotland. The snakes slithered from mainland Europe to England, but by the time they had gone all the way North to Scotland, the land bridge had melted. Snakes never left Ireland; they never made it to Ireland in the first place.

Personally, I hope it was the second one because as we all know from the first post moving species is never a good idea. St. Patrick, please, the snakes will get their own shit together, just leave them be.

Anyway, however this happened, all the hard work is going down the drain. Some eejit (that's Irish-English for idiot) couldn't take care of their pet snakes and let them go. Or so the papers say...

I think that the snakes hatched a great escape plan. I mean, really, what's worse than being in a foreign country in a little glass cage? So they all got together and ran away. However it happened, now there are wild snakes in Ireland. Sorry if you were planning your next vacation there.

On New Orleans' Solution, Gray Squirrels, and Other Disasters

I recently heard about a well-covered-up-for American meat shortage about 100 years ago (speaking of well-covered-up-for, every U.S. president has had multiple assassination attempts that the Secret Service doesn't tell us about). In addition to this meat shortage, which was caused by the rapidly growing population, the turn of the century United States had another problem: the water hyacinth, native to Brazil, had been introduced to Louisiana, where it was clogging drains, pipes, and rivers and competing with native species such as pickerelweed. Congress had an amazing solution: bring hippopotamus herds to Louisiana. The hippopotami would eat the water hyacinth in addition to providing a new meat source for the country. Can you think of a better idea than that?

Of course, this solution did not turn out very well. If Congress had been thinking (but that's too much to ask, I suppose), they would realize that introducing invasive species never turns out well. Ask any red squirrel in Ireland and they will wholeheartedly agree (if they understand the question). Red squirrels are native to Ireland but in 1911, some geniuses decided that gray squirrels would be a nice addition to Irish wildlife and released twelve at Castle Forbes, Co. Longford. Within a few decades, those twelve squirrels populated most of Ireland. Gray squirrels, from North America, are bigger and better at collecting food and surviving in deciduous woodland habitats. The only thing going for the red squirrels is that they weren't in a deciduous woodland habitat due to all of the deforestation in Ireland. The only good effect of deforestation I have heard so far.

So, that said, please keep your animals to yourself. Introducing species where they don't belong is a recipe for disaster. Also, please vote for me for Congress because I think I would do a much better job.