The Rusty-spotted cat (Prionailurus rubiginosus), found only in Sri Lanka and India, and is the smallest member of the cat family. The IUCN has the Rusty-spotted cat listed as "Vulnerable" since 2002, and according to a study taken in 2007, it is suspected that fewer than 10,000 mature individuals remain in the wild. These numbers are in continuous loss due to habitat loss and hunting for the cat's pelt. However, they have been observed with increasing frequency, sometimes even appearing nearby and within villages, although in other parts of the cat's range it is glimpsed with increasing rarity. They tend to occupy moist and dry deciduous forests as well as scrub and grassland, and do not appear in the evergreen forests of India.
Showing posts with label Asia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Asia. Show all posts
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Animal of the Day: Rusty-Spotted Cat
The Rusty-spotted cat (Prionailurus rubiginosus), found only in Sri Lanka and India, and is the smallest member of the cat family. The IUCN has the Rusty-spotted cat listed as "Vulnerable" since 2002, and according to a study taken in 2007, it is suspected that fewer than 10,000 mature individuals remain in the wild. These numbers are in continuous loss due to habitat loss and hunting for the cat's pelt. However, they have been observed with increasing frequency, sometimes even appearing nearby and within villages, although in other parts of the cat's range it is glimpsed with increasing rarity. They tend to occupy moist and dry deciduous forests as well as scrub and grassland, and do not appear in the evergreen forests of India.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Georg Wilhelm Steller
As of tomorrow, a man named Georg Wilhelm Steller passed away 266 years ago. Steller, as we talked about a few weeks ago, discovered a few very interesting animals, and was the first non-native (at least that we know of) to set foot in Alaska, in 1741. He was therefore the first European naturalist to discover, as well as describe, a number of animals in the area.
Many of the members of the crew of the boat that he was on were coming down with scurvy, and Steller attempted to cull the growing epidemic by feeding berries and leaves to the crew. No one really heeded his advice, which was why, on the returning journey, they all became shipwrecked, as only 12 crew members were actually able to physically move. During the voyage almost half of the crew had died due to scurvy, and many, including the captain, died following the shipwreck. With very little food and water, the survivors created a camp, suffering frequent raids by the arctic fox, which only served to increase their peril.
Nevertheless, Steller, apparently the stoic type, continued to learn more about the natural world of Alaska. He recorded a good deal of information in regards to the Steller's sea cow (a relative of the manatee), which, as a species, only survived about 25 years after Steller first discovered them. Other animals that he discovered, described, or both include the Steller's eider (a type of duck), the spectacled cormorant (like the sea cow, now extinct), the sea otter, Steller's sea lion, and the northern fur seal.
In 1742, the survivors were eventually able to build a new boat from the salvage, and returned to Avacha Bay in Russia. Steller continued to explore the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia for the next two years, but died in 1746 in transit to St. Petersburg.
One final thing that I find interesting about Steller has to do with the post-mortem publication of his journals. They were published by the German zoologist and biologist Peter Simon Pallas who, you guessed it, is the namesake of the Pallas cat, or Pallas's cat, who was the first person to describe the animal in 1776. These journals proved to be useful to other explorers of the same region such as Captain Cook.
Many of the members of the crew of the boat that he was on were coming down with scurvy, and Steller attempted to cull the growing epidemic by feeding berries and leaves to the crew. No one really heeded his advice, which was why, on the returning journey, they all became shipwrecked, as only 12 crew members were actually able to physically move. During the voyage almost half of the crew had died due to scurvy, and many, including the captain, died following the shipwreck. With very little food and water, the survivors created a camp, suffering frequent raids by the arctic fox, which only served to increase their peril.
Nevertheless, Steller, apparently the stoic type, continued to learn more about the natural world of Alaska. He recorded a good deal of information in regards to the Steller's sea cow (a relative of the manatee), which, as a species, only survived about 25 years after Steller first discovered them. Other animals that he discovered, described, or both include the Steller's eider (a type of duck), the spectacled cormorant (like the sea cow, now extinct), the sea otter, Steller's sea lion, and the northern fur seal.
In 1742, the survivors were eventually able to build a new boat from the salvage, and returned to Avacha Bay in Russia. Steller continued to explore the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia for the next two years, but died in 1746 in transit to St. Petersburg.
One final thing that I find interesting about Steller has to do with the post-mortem publication of his journals. They were published by the German zoologist and biologist Peter Simon Pallas who, you guessed it, is the namesake of the Pallas cat, or Pallas's cat, who was the first person to describe the animal in 1776. These journals proved to be useful to other explorers of the same region such as Captain Cook.
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| An excellent picture that I took of the Pallas cat (if I do say so myself) from the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo |
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Zoo Spotlight: The Living Desert
So at least a few times now, I have used pictures from a zoo we went to in Palm Desert called "The Living Desert." An awesome zoo, this place (clearly) focuses a lot more on the desert animals of the world, and introduces you to a number of animals that you immediately recognize, and a number of animals that you might not otherwise be able to see at another zoo. I thought I could share some of the pictures that I took at this exciting place, and recommend it to one and all as an exciting place to visit if you ever pass by that area!
Let's start off with some of the animals that you might not be able to see at most other zoos. As regular readers know, I am a pretty big fan of cats, and The Living Desert definitely had its fair share! For example, the "Near Threatened" sand cat (Felis margarita), the only cat that is found primarily in the desert. One of my favorite small wild cats, the sand cat is found in the deserts of Africa and the Middle East.
Besides the sand cat, The Living Desert also has a few other small cats, including the Arabian wild cat, one of the many sub species of the wild cat, Felis silvestris. Unfortunately, this little guy was asleep so I didn't get any pictures, but I did get pictures of two of the other smaller felines: the serval, and the bobcat, each of which we have done an Animal Spotlight on. The serval is native to Africa, while the bobcat lives all over North America, in both forests and deserts.
Other, larger cats can be found at The Living Desert, as well, including the jaguar and the mountain lion (both of which I got no pictures of), as well as the cheetah. We saw two or three cheetahs, but they were all doing what cats do best: sleeping!
Another very interesting thing about the zoo is the vegetation. Many people simply pass over it: but if you do stop to take a look at it, you might notice something interesting: a whole bunch of the plants, both in and out of the exhibits, are very prickly! This is because the people at The Living Desert have done their best to make the vegetation in their exhibits as accurate as possible. Pay special attention to the trees once you reach the large exhibit with both giraffes and kudu, a type of African antelope. These incredibly spiky trees are called acacia trees, and these trees are one of the reasons why the giraffe has such an incredibly long tongue. I've been able to see this tongue first hand on numerous occasion at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, including the last time I went with my friend Masaki Kleinkopf, as you can see in this incredible video. The giraffe has been forced to evolve its incredibly long, prehensile in order to circumnavigate through and around these spiny branches in order to reach the leaves.
Another one of my favorite things at The Living Desert was the Miriam U. Hoover Discovery Center. Indoor and air-conditioned (which, trust me, was very refreshing after being in a desert for a while!), the Discovery Center had a number of things for younger kids to do, but it was definitely worth stopping in, because they had an exhibit talking about the Pleistocene (2.5 MYA - 12,000 years ago) residents of California! Here are what some of the coolest fossils were.
A full skeleton of the eight-foot-tall giant ground sloth. The relationship between extinct South American ground sloths and the extant tree sloths was one of the most important things that influenced Charles Darwin into his Theory of Evolution, more so than the case of the Galápagos finches that most textbooks cite. During the Great American Interchange, at a time when many South American species were going extinct due to competition from animals coming down the Isthmus of Panama from North America (like Thylacosmilus), the giant ground sloths were actually able to move the other way, with remains being found even as far north as Alaska.
A skull of the North American lion (Panthera atrox), as well as a skull from Smilodon, colloquially known as the "saber-toothed cat."
Skulls of Camelops (a type of camel); a dire wolf (Canis dirus), a significantly larger relative of the extant gray wolf; and the Teratorn, one of the members of the family Teratornithidae, a group of birds of prey that lived in North and South America, and includes the largest flying bird known, Argentavis. Finally, there was a life-sized picture of a mammoth on the wall with a fossil tusk sticking out which was pretty cool as well!
Now, back to the living! Here are some more pictures of some of the really cool animals that we saw!
There was also a really cool, huge, giant train set! Here are a bunch of pictures of it!
So would I recommend The Living Desert to anyone who is going to be in the area? You bet I would! Not only is it an excellent zoo, it gives the visitor an interesting and often difficult-to-find view of desert life from around the world!
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| Sand cat |
Let's start off with some of the animals that you might not be able to see at most other zoos. As regular readers know, I am a pretty big fan of cats, and The Living Desert definitely had its fair share! For example, the "Near Threatened" sand cat (Felis margarita), the only cat that is found primarily in the desert. One of my favorite small wild cats, the sand cat is found in the deserts of Africa and the Middle East.
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| Sand cat |
Besides the sand cat, The Living Desert also has a few other small cats, including the Arabian wild cat, one of the many sub species of the wild cat, Felis silvestris. Unfortunately, this little guy was asleep so I didn't get any pictures, but I did get pictures of two of the other smaller felines: the serval, and the bobcat, each of which we have done an Animal Spotlight on. The serval is native to Africa, while the bobcat lives all over North America, in both forests and deserts.
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| Sleeping serval |
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| Bobcat on the prowl |
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| Bobcat....stretch! |
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| Sleeping cheetah! |
Another very interesting thing about the zoo is the vegetation. Many people simply pass over it: but if you do stop to take a look at it, you might notice something interesting: a whole bunch of the plants, both in and out of the exhibits, are very prickly! This is because the people at The Living Desert have done their best to make the vegetation in their exhibits as accurate as possible. Pay special attention to the trees once you reach the large exhibit with both giraffes and kudu, a type of African antelope. These incredibly spiky trees are called acacia trees, and these trees are one of the reasons why the giraffe has such an incredibly long tongue. I've been able to see this tongue first hand on numerous occasion at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, including the last time I went with my friend Masaki Kleinkopf, as you can see in this incredible video. The giraffe has been forced to evolve its incredibly long, prehensile in order to circumnavigate through and around these spiny branches in order to reach the leaves.
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| Look at those spikes on those acacia trees! |
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| A picture of myself feeding the giraffes at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo |
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| Grazing kudu |
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| Mounted giant ground sloth skeleton |
A full skeleton of the eight-foot-tall giant ground sloth. The relationship between extinct South American ground sloths and the extant tree sloths was one of the most important things that influenced Charles Darwin into his Theory of Evolution, more so than the case of the Galápagos finches that most textbooks cite. During the Great American Interchange, at a time when many South American species were going extinct due to competition from animals coming down the Isthmus of Panama from North America (like Thylacosmilus), the giant ground sloths were actually able to move the other way, with remains being found even as far north as Alaska.
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| The skull of Panthera atrox, the North American lion |
A skull of the North American lion (Panthera atrox), as well as a skull from Smilodon, colloquially known as the "saber-toothed cat."
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| The skull of Smilodon |
Skulls of Camelops (a type of camel); a dire wolf (Canis dirus), a significantly larger relative of the extant gray wolf; and the Teratorn, one of the members of the family Teratornithidae, a group of birds of prey that lived in North and South America, and includes the largest flying bird known, Argentavis. Finally, there was a life-sized picture of a mammoth on the wall with a fossil tusk sticking out which was pretty cool as well!
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| The skull of Camelops |
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| The skull of the dire wolf |
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| The skull of the Teratorn |
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| A size comparison of a mammoth and a human, myself |
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| The "Critically Endangered" addax (Addax nasomaculatus), native to the Sahara Desert |
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| The "Endangered" African wild dog (Lycaon pictus), native to (you guessed it) Africa |
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| American badger |
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| Bighorn sheep |
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| Burrowing owl |
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| Dromedary camel |
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| Caracara |
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| Sleeping fennec fox |
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| Another sleeping fennec fox |
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| Giant tortoises eating |
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| Mexican wolf |
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| Another Mexican wolf. Despite the fact that this wolf looks like it is snarling, it actually wasn't! I don't actually know what was going on! |
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| A Mexican wolf running |
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| Pronghorn |
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| There were also tons of lizards running around all over the place! |
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| Incredibly detailed: the Monticello vineyards! |
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| Incredibly detailed: Mount Rushmore! |
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Proterosuchus....or Should I Say "Broterosuchus?"
Before we learn about Proterosuchus, it will be helpful to discuss where this creature comes from. Proterosuchus is an archosaur, and to understand what an archosaur is, we must first travel back 320 million years into Earth's history: back....to the middle of the Carboniferous Period. To travel back to that period of Earth's history, click HERE TO SEE A POST I JUST MADE ABOUT THE EVOLUTION OF THE ANIMALS THAT WE ARE TALKING ABOUT RIGHT NOW. Unless, of course, you are fine with just accepting the idea that the archosaurs are relatives of the dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and crocodilians, in which case you can just skip that post. I think it's interesting, though, so it might be worth checking out!
Well, that was confusing. So how does all of this evolutionary rig-a-ma-roll pertain to Proterosuchus? Well, in his excellent book entitled "Gorgon," paleontologist Peter D. Ward actually talks about that. Here is that passage from his book:
"During the Triassic a whole new suite of vertebrates populated the land. The oldest true "ruling reptiles," the stock that would ultimately give rise to the dinosaurs, are found in the oldest rocks of the Triassic. The most ancient of these is Proterosuchus. Yet within several million years, there was a variety of these predinosaurs, belonging to a group known as the archosaurs. From these ancestral stocks the successful lines of crocodiles and crocodile-like animals known as phytosaurs evolved. From other members of this group came lizards, snakes, and, by the middle of the Triassic, the first true dinosaurs."
Well, that certainly sums it up quite nicely, don't you think! Anyways, Proterosuchus was around the size of the extant Komodo dragon, and was one of the largest reptiles alive during its time, in the Early Triassic Period. Similar in appearance to the modern day crocodiles, it has been theorized that this animal would lie in wait much like the crocodilians, ambushing its prey when it came down to bodies of water to drink. One bit of evidence that causes some scientists to believe that Proterosuchus hunted like the crocodilians was that the eyes of Proterosuchus were were located on top of its head, again like the crocodilians.
Remains of Proterosuchus are known from both China and South Africa, where it was first discovered by Robert Broom, a famous South African paleontologist, in 1903. This specimen was discovered in the Karoo Basin, an enormous desert in South Africa where large numbers of fossils have been discovered.
Well, that was confusing. So how does all of this evolutionary rig-a-ma-roll pertain to Proterosuchus? Well, in his excellent book entitled "Gorgon," paleontologist Peter D. Ward actually talks about that. Here is that passage from his book:
"During the Triassic a whole new suite of vertebrates populated the land. The oldest true "ruling reptiles," the stock that would ultimately give rise to the dinosaurs, are found in the oldest rocks of the Triassic. The most ancient of these is Proterosuchus. Yet within several million years, there was a variety of these predinosaurs, belonging to a group known as the archosaurs. From these ancestral stocks the successful lines of crocodiles and crocodile-like animals known as phytosaurs evolved. From other members of this group came lizards, snakes, and, by the middle of the Triassic, the first true dinosaurs."
Well, that certainly sums it up quite nicely, don't you think! Anyways, Proterosuchus was around the size of the extant Komodo dragon, and was one of the largest reptiles alive during its time, in the Early Triassic Period. Similar in appearance to the modern day crocodiles, it has been theorized that this animal would lie in wait much like the crocodilians, ambushing its prey when it came down to bodies of water to drink. One bit of evidence that causes some scientists to believe that Proterosuchus hunted like the crocodilians was that the eyes of Proterosuchus were were located on top of its head, again like the crocodilians.
Remains of Proterosuchus are known from both China and South Africa, where it was first discovered by Robert Broom, a famous South African paleontologist, in 1903. This specimen was discovered in the Karoo Basin, an enormous desert in South Africa where large numbers of fossils have been discovered.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Viagra, Pornography, and the Giant Panda
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| One of the many pictures of the giant panda that we took at the San Diego Zoo in California. In fact, all of the giant panda pictures in this post were taken by my family and I. |
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| Notice how the panda is grasping the bamboo, employing the use of its thumb appendages |
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| The giant panda at the zoo searching for the food that the zookeepers left for it around the exhibit |
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| No panda pornography here, but more of "The giant panda at the zoo searching for the food that the zookeepers left for it around the exhibit" |
Many attempts to breed the giant panda in captivity have been made, given its "Endangered" status. They are doing better now, and many pandas have been bred in zoos in China as well as at the San Diego Zoo in California, where apparently six have now been born. (To see the "Panda Cam" at the zoo, click HEREEEEE). Zoologists at a Chiang Mai Zoo in Thailand showed their pandas "panda pornogrpahy," literally just a bunch of videos of other giant pandas mating. They hoped that the pandas would use this as a guide, and that it would arouse them. Huh. Despite the fact that this particular group of zoologists seemed to think the whole thing a success, efforts to duplicate the experiment have failed, causing the whole concept of panda pornography to come under intense scrutiny.
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| The giant panda at the zoo searching for the food that the zookeepers left for it around the exhibit |
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| The giant panda at the zoo searching for the food that the zookeepers left for it around the exhibit |
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| The giant panda at the zoo searching for the food that the zookeepers left for it around the exhibit |
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| The giant panda, again grasping its food with its "pseudo-thumb" thingy |
Now for those of you who want a funny panda video, click on the link before to see one of my most favorite videos of all time: the Sneezing Baby Panda. And for those of you who want more, just click on one of my new favorite videos, the "Escaping Baby Pandas" video, below the link below! Enjoy!
The Sneezing Baby Panda!
Escaping Baby Pandas
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