Thorny Trees and 20 Inch Tongues: A Case of Coevolution

A few days ago, I saw a very spiky-looking tree on the Bird of Prey Route near my house.  A few weeks ago, I saw another tree, much larger than this one, along the banks of Boulder Creek that had some enormous thorns on its branches as well, some of them easily six inches long, and super sharp on the end!  I don't know for certain what kind of tree this, or the Boulder Creek tree, is, but a good candidate I think is the honey locust (Gleditsia triacanthos), or some other tree closely related to the honey locust.  Below is the picture of the tree that I took on the Bird of Prey Route.

And here is the picture that I took on my iPhone at Boulder Creek of this tree.  The thorns look pretty similar to those of the honey locust, and I think that the trunk of the tree looks pretty similar, too.

Now why do these trees have such huge thorns?  When it comes to nature, everything evolves with a purpose.  There is no reason why a living organism would evolve something without a purpose, especially something as involved as giant, six-inch long thorns.  The question is, what purpose do these thorns serve?  Well that's a darn good question, and I am very pleased you asked.  Much like the "thorns" that you can see on the tail of a Stegosaurus, they likely were to help keep the organism from being consumed.  We see similar thorns on the branches of some trees in the genus Acacia in Africa today.  There, the thorns help protect the tree from attacks from one of the largest plant predators alive today, the giraffe.  This tree....well, suffice it to say that you probably won't see many activists hugging this tree.

"Oh, maybe these thorns look deceptively big," you're thinking.  Wrong.  These thorns do not look deceptively big.  If anything, they look deceptively small.  These thorns are frickin' HUGE.

So the real question is, why the long thorns, Goldilocks?  Many paleontologists believe that, during the Pleistocene Epoch (which lasted from between around 2.5 MYA to about 12,000 years ago), many of North America's mega-herbivores, everything ranging from mammoths and mastodons, to giant ground sloths and the North American camel Camelops, could have been preying upon these trees.  Selective pressures slowly caused these trees to evolve protection against these mammalian mega-herbivores.  Mastodons especially had very robust teeth, which would almost certainly have made them excellent bark-munchers.

In Africa, the acacia tree, also known as the whistling thorn, the thorntree, or (my personal favorite) the wattle, has a very similar defense.  Unlike the honey locust of North America, however, the acacia tree still has to deal with intense predation today, and from a wide variety of herbivores, everything from gerenuk to giraffe, elephants to more giraffes.

You see, the giraffes love the acacia tree.  If giraffes had Facebook, then they all would like the "I <3 Acacia Trees" page.  I remember reading somewhere that they can eat up to 60 or 65 pounds of acacia leaves per day.  (To understand this, try imagining a large hunk of butter that weighs 60 or 65 pounds.  Now you have an idea of how many pounds that is.)  They love it so much that, if the acacia tree hadn't adapted to keep up with the continual browsing pressure, the giraffes might have loved the acacia trees to death!  In response, the acacia trees convergently evolved these sharp thorns, just like the honey locust tree in North America.  (We talk about convergent evolution quite a lot as it is one of my favorite topics, so click HERE to learn more about it!)  

The giraffes love the acacia, though.  They aren't going to give up on those lovely leaves, just like that!  So while these acacia trees evolved their thorns to protect their leaves, the giraffes evolved something spectacular: a prehensile tongue!  Don't believe me?  Well, one of my favorite things about the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo is that you can feed the giraffes there.  And guess what: their tongues are HUGE!  Below, I have a video of my good friend Masaki Kleinkopf also feeding the giraffes!  Check out my gangsta hoodie, yo.  

So, yeah.  Suffice it to say, giraffes have frickin' long tongues.  And they use these TWENTY INCH LONG TONGUES to help circumnavigate through the acacia tree's poky and spiny maze of thorns to reach the leaves!  The acacia tree wasn't going to just take this lying down, though: no giraffe is going to be feeding on my leaves, yo!  So the acacia tree adapted again.  This time, by employing the use of tannins.

Long story short, tannins are used by humans in a variety of ways, including tanning, food processing, and making cocoa and wine.  They also apparently taste terrible.  Don't ask me, I've never tried it, but then again I don't have a 20 inch prehensile tongue, so it's a whole different ballgame.*

Not only do tannins taste terrible, but they inhibit the digestion of the leaf matter in a number of nasty ways, none of which would be all that fun for the giraffe.  So when a giraffe starts munching on the leaves of the acacia tree, that tree will release tannins to make the leaves taste like....well, leather I suppose.  (Again, haven't tried either.)  This tannin releasing is a pretty cool adaptation all on its lonseome.  The giraffe begins to move off to another acacia tree nearby.  However, if it's within 50 yards or so (especially downwind) of the original, now tanniny acacia, then the giraffe is out of luck: the nearby acacias react in turn, releasing their own tannins, and rendering their leaves almost indigestible to the giraffes, as well!  I would imagine that, because of this, giraffes have in turn developed the behavior of moving upwind as they eat, and a cursory glance over the Internet indicates that this does seem to be a behavior observed in giraffes!  Coevolution at its finest!

Make sure to check back soon for our next episode in our coevolution series, all about a very fun little squirrel!  See you then!  In the meantime, you can read about what coevolution actually is, by clicking HERE.

*The second baseball metaphor that I believe has been used on this blog.  Refer to "23-Fact Tuesday: Prairie Falcon, Red-Tailed Hawk, and Great-Horned Owl at the Dino Hotel" and "Eye Black: What Works for Football Players Works for the Cheetah" to learn more about this sport.  

Works Cited:

An Amur Leopard Upchucks

On Saturday, January 26th, my father and I drove down to Colorado Springs to see a few of my friends perform in the Colorado All State Jazz Band.  Before the concert, we met up with my grandma and grandpa, and went up to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo for an hour or so.  We saw a few cool things, all of which I will share with you in the next post, but this post I wanted to devote to the "Critically Endangered" sub-species of the leopard, the elusive and mysterious Amur leopard.  Fewer than thirty of these amazing creatures are thought to be alive in the wilds of southeastern Russia and northeastern China, in the Primorye region.  Poachers have taken an immense toll on the numbers of this cat, as its pelt is highly prized.  Like that of the snow leopard, another fairly large cat that also lives in a very cold, harsh environment, the Amur leopard has a very soft and, for lack of a better term, floofy, coat.

The Amur leopard prior to its little....episode.

Since the number of people who see an Amur leopard in the wild per year could almost certainly be counted on one hand, you are very unlikely to see this animal lose its lunch.  For that, you would have to go to a zoo. Now, don't get me wrong, we didn't go to the zoo just to see animals throw up, but it was definitely an interesting addition to our day!  I do hope that the poor animal is feeling better, though.  If you want to see the video of the animal barfing, click on the link below.  It's not actually as gross as it sounds, trust me!  Also, please enjoy some pictures of the beautiful cat PRIOR to its cookie tossing.  

The leopard recovers after it loses its cool

The Denver Gem and Mineral Show Part 6: Dinosaurs and Their Ancient Relatives

At last: here we go on the sixth post of our Denver Gem and Mineral Show series!  Even though I went with my friend Masaki Kleinkopf a few months ago, I still have a large number of picture that I am eager to share with you.  If you are interested in reading about the other posts in this series, feel free to check out the Homebase for the series HERE, with links to all of the other posts in the series that have been created thus far!  Today we will be looking at the dinosaurs, as well as an ancient relative!  Fasten your seat belts, everyone!

Here we have the skull of Allosaurus!  We have discussed Allosaurus extensively, especially in our 23-Fact Tuesday post, so click HERE to learn more about this fascinating creature!

A dinosaur who needs no introduction, but, as you can see, I am introducing him anyways: Tyrannosaurus rex!  I believe the second picture is of the foot of Tyrannosaurus, but I am not one hundred percent positive.

Psittacosaurus, one of the most primitive ceratopsian dinosaurs known to science.  It doesn't even have a frill or horns!  So how do we know that it is a ceratopsian dinosaur?  It has an extra bone on its upper jaw called the rostral.  It is this bone that distinguishes the ceratopsians from the other groups of dinosaurs.

Another dinosaur foot, this one belonging to Diplodocus, a large sauropod from the Late Jurassic Period, whose remains are found in the Morrison Formation. 

 Some fossil footprints that I am guessing belong to a theropod dinosaur, but I don't actually know.

Some fossil bones of a hadrosaur known as Edmontosaurus.  Here is what the card says: "Edmontosaurus sp.  Cervical vertebrae and bone.  Lance Formation.  Maastrichtian.  Late Cretaceous.  Niobrara County, Wyoming."

Some teeth belonging to the massive carnivorous dinosaur Carcharodontosaurus.  Up at the top of the picture, you can see a few from Spinosaurus, as well. 

Various teeth and claws from the Rocky Mountain Dinosaur Resource Center (RMDRC) booth.

This last guy, Desmatosuchus, is not actually a dinosaur, but a type of archosaur.  Although it looks quite fierce, Desmatosuchus belongs to an order of Late Triassic herbivores called the aetosaurs.  Desmatosuchus in particular has been found in Texas, and was around 15 or 16 feet in length. 

Denver on Dwellable

Meeting the African Penguins!

I also was just able to upload another one of the many videos that I took when me, my dad, my grandma and grandpa, and my friend Masaki Kleinkopf went to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo a month or so ago and got to meet the African penguins there!  This video takes place before we actually enter the enclosure, while we are still looking in on the penguins at the entrance to the exhibit!  Enjoy, and be sure to check out some of the other videos on there while you are at it!

 Meeting the African Penguins!

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At Last: Success With Primos!

Today's birthday post goes out to Megan Pullen!  Happy birthday Megan!  If you have a birthday coming up, just email me the date at cuyvaldar123946@gmail.com with the date and your favorite animal, and I will do my best to get a post in!

So the lock that I had ordered for my Primos Truth Cam finally arrived over the weekend, and on Sunday night I was finally able to set up the camera!  I made sure to use some of the fox urine in and around the area in the hopes of attracting red foxes.....and we got ourselves a hit!

For those of you wondering how in the heck I got fox urine, not to mention why, here is the skinny.  I started this thing called Foxbook.  Here is the description about what exactly it is, lifted from my "Foxbook" tab.  "Recently, my friend Masaki Kleinkopf and I started an experiment of sorts, to see whether foxes were in the area.  My mother had purchased fox urine to spray in her garden to keep garden pests such as squirrels from eating her vegetables.  I borrowed some and sprayed a bit on a wall near by to my use.  Underneath the spray site, I buried a plastic bin, and poured water into the dirt in the bin.  This turned the dirt into mud, and the plastic bin prevented the water from draining.  So now the bin remains muddy for days at a time, making it more likely for the fox visitors to leave footprints.  On the very first day, we got a hit, and three of the four days now we have gotten hits!  In perhaps my best pun yet, I created the term "Foxbook."  You see, it is like a social messaging site, where visitors can leave "Posts" on other peoples "Walls."  Haha."

So there is that.  We also got a skunky visitor, as well, along with a little child who tried to steal the camera from the tree.  Thank goodness for the lock!  Anyways, here are the pictures!  Enjoy them!

We have actually talked about foxes a great many times on this blog in the past.  Here are the posts in which we have done so:

• Channel Island Fox:  Shrinky Dink: The Channel Island Fox and the Island Effect
• Red Fox:  Guards of the Fairy Penguin
• Fennec Fox:  What Is It?  The Weekly Challenge #5 Answer
• Gray Fox:  The Fauna of South Carolina: Cetaceans, Foxes and Otters
• Red Fox:  The Fox's Animal Magnetism

Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

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Teaching African Penguins to Bite!

Today I uploaded another video from our Cheyenne Mountain Zoo adventures!  This one also features the African penguins, but in this video, my father is essentially teaching the penguins to bite him if they want the toys!  He said it didn't hurt it, it was just a playful nip, but still!  So if the keepers at the zoo are wondering why some of the penguins have become super aggressive when it comes to getting what they want, then I think I know why.....Enjoy!

One African penguin contemplates another!

My Dad Teaches African Penguins To Bite For Toys!

And remember the Primos Truth Cam?  Don't worry about a thing, he is coming back, and hopefully soon!  I just need to order her a lock so that no one steal her when I set her up!  We will soon see some fox pictures, though, I guarantee!

Florissant on Dwellable

Daisy Post-Dentist, Yoga Bear, and Giraffe Feeding

So, as you probably know, I am still working to get all of my videos uploaded from our behind the scenes experience at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, and to be able to give you guys an overview of what we did at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo last Friday.  In the meantime, I am going to treat you to a few of these videos that I have uploaded, as well as another video that I made yesterday, and another pretty cool video!

Myself feeding the giraffes

So as I told you before, we were able to feed the giraffes!  Here is a brief video of both Masaki and myself feeding them lettuce.  This is the first time that I have gone to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo when they have fed them lettuce, in the past it has always been crackers.  This, apparently, is to keep the giraffes healthier.  Makes sense!

Masaki and I Feed the Giraffes

I also uploaded the video from the grizzly bear experience, the one where one of the bears is doing what the keepers call the "Yoga Bear."  There were two bears there, and I don't recall whether it was Emmett or Digger who was doing the "Yoga Bear."  You will be able to see clearly why it is called that in the video, as well as in the picture below!  Apparently this is a behavior that was not taught into the bear, and is an action that has been observed before in wild bears, both in the wild and in wild bears that have been brought into captivity.  This particular bear apparently did it once when he was first brought to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo from California (I believe), but then didn't do it again for four years.  Now he does it all the time apparently, as the keepers will typically reward that kind of behavior.  Enjoy the video!

The "Yoga Bear!"

The "Yoga Bear!"

Next up is our dog, Daisy, who is a beagle-basset mix.  Daisy went to the dentist's office yesterday morning, where they had to put her under in order to clean her teeth.  When she came back, she was still pretty drugged, and kept falling asleep while she was sitting up, barely able to keep her eyes open!  I hope you enjoy this video as much as I do!  Also, if you listen carefully, you can hear our cat, Chimney, howling for food in the background.  Enjoy!

Daisy the Dog, Post Dentist Appointment

Finally, for those of you who haven't heard about the record-breaking leap made by Felix Baumgartner yesterday, click HERE to learn more!  It was some pretty astonishing stuff!

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Behind The Scenes at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo!

So, as promised, something especially exciting happened at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo this weekend!  My grandparents, Ted and Gail Neher, were able to get my dad (Mark Neher), friend (Masaki Kleinkopf), and I behind the scenes!  We got to play with the penguins, feed the grizzly bears, and check out the new elephant barn!  I am still trying to get all of my media files together (I took a LOT of video, not to mention the pictures!) but I thought that I could give you all a taste of the action right now!

Thanks again to Kelley Parker for showing us around, that was super awesome of you!  Thanks again!

First off, the penguins!  We actually got to go INSIDE OF THE ENCLOSURE and play with the penguins!  We were able to touch them, and I even got a feather or two!  (Off of the floor, of course, I wasn't just going in there and plucking the penguins!) 

 

Here, my dad and Masaki are scattering the toys for the penguins.  This way, they are able to stimulate their minds as they hunt around looking for the toys!

 

 

One of the penguins stops to admire my snazzy shoes!

 

 

Now, here are a few videos!

First, a comedic video that I made featuring penguins and Star Wars!  Enjoy!

Star Wars Penguins!

Here are the other three penguin clips that I have uploaded thus far:

African Penguin Grabs Donut Toy From My Hand
Playing With Penguins!
African Penguin Encounter!

Our next stop was at the grizzly bear enclosure!  We got to feed them!  Not by hand, of course, as that would be incredibly dangerous.  I only have one clip up so far, but it shows exactly how it is done!

Masaki Feeding The Grizzlies!

The so-called "Yoga Bear!"

 

 

 

Our third, and final, stop on the behind the scenes tour was a look at the new Elephant Barn!  We were unable to go on the ground floor due to the fact that the zoo's new rhinoceros had arrived within the last few days, but we were able to go up on the overhead viewing platform and check out the elephants, and we even got a glimpse of the rhino, too!  I took a lot of video here, and, again, I will post more soon when I have my wits about me!

The exterior of the elephant barn!

What will one day be (I believe) an elephant walkway.  Either that or a human walkway!

I promise, there will be more later!  Let me get my act together, and then you will be able to see more!  A WHOLE lot more!

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