What Is It? The Weekly Challenge #3 Answer

Today's animal was easier for many of you, and we had a number of good guesses!  We had a few close guesses (like the American Kestrel, another North American bird of prey, but we had one totally right answer.  This weeks winner is Julie N., who guessed the Peregrine Falcon!

Peregrine Falcon

 The Peregrine Falcon is one of my favorite birds, mainly because of how it hunts.  It dives at medium-sized birds from up to 3,000 feet in the air, and often dives towards the birds with the sun at its back; that way, its prey has a difficult time of seeing them through the sun's glare.  In its dive, speeds of 175 - 200 mph have been recorded, placing it at the terminal velocity able to be achieved by the bird.  Some people have reported that the peregrine can exceed terminal velocity but, despite being taken in by this theory for a time, I believe that this not, in fact, true.  (I am not that into the math or physics, but I believe it might even be impossible, but I'm sure some of you know that better than me!)  Click on the link below to learn a little more, and to see the bird in action!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKqt05iR9WI&feature=player_embedded#!

Although their population numbers suffered tremendous, pesticide-induced blows during the 20th century, they have made quite a comeback throughout the United States.  However, it was a close call.  Use of pesticides like DDT (commonly known as DEET, used to be common in mosquito repellent before its negative impacts on the environment became fully known) caused the Peregrine Falcon's eggshells to become weak, and they were easily broken.  The result of this was very few baby falcons surviving to breed themselves.  In fact, at one point it got so bad that the Peregrine Falcon was listed as "Endangered" by the IUCN in the 1950's through the 1970's.  It became extirpated, or locally extinct, in both Belgium and the eastern United States.  However, now it is labeled as "Least Concern;" an amazing comeback, for an amazing bird.

This picture of the Peregrine Falcon was taken by me, last week at the Reptile Day at Dinosaur Ridge, near Golden.  My friend Masaki Kleinkopf and I went and were able to see a few pretty cool things, the Peregrine Falcon being just one of them.  I highly recommend going to check out the Ridge, as well as the museum they have there, it is really quire interesting!

Don't forget to check in later in the day for this week's challenge!

Animal Spotlight: The Bobcat

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The bobcat is one of three main felines that lives in North America, the others being the Canadian lynx and the mountain lion.  (Although other cats, like the jaguar, jaguarundi and ocelot, do occasionally make it up to Texas and Mexico, generally they just live in Central and South America).  Labeled "Least Concern" by the IUCN, the bobcat averages around three feet in length, and is named such for the short, "bobbed" tail.

A bobcat at The Living Desert in Palm Desert, California.  Note the short, stubby tail.

The bobcat is quite adaptable; it inhabits almost every single environment that the Continental United States has to offer, as well as most of Mexico.  There are thirteen recognized sub-species of bobcat.  Furthermore, despite its size, can be strong enough to take down small deer.  Here is a link to a video about a bobcat that I found to be quite interesting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5BfNtim148

When we went camping last week, twice did we see paw prints that looked too small to be mountain lion prints, and were most likely bobcat prints.  I was quite excited; unfortunately (but not surprisingly) we didn't see any of the cats themselves.  Here is one picture from each of the times we saw the tracks. 

East Palm Desert on Dwellable

The Thagomizer of Stegosaurus

Stegosaurus is a very famous dinosaurs, one of the most famous, along with Triceratops and Tyrannosaurus.  All three of these dinosaurs have been found in Colorado; in fact, the first Triceratops bones were actually found in Denver, and Stegosaurus is the state dinosaur of Colorado!  Stegosaurus has also been found in Wyoming and Utah, in the Morrison Formation, as well as in Portugal.  The row of plates along its back make it very interesting looking, as do the spikes on the end of its tail, nicknamed a "thagomizer."  Holes in the vertebrae of a potential predator of Stegosaurus, Allosaurus, fit exactly with the size of one of the spikes on the tail of the Stegosaurus, showing that there was almost certainly a predator-prey relationship between the two, as was previously suspected.  Studies have shown that the tail end of Kentrosaurus, a close relative of Stegosaurus, also with a thagomizer on its tail, could have been brought around to the side of the dinosaur, potentially swatting at enemies trying to attack the Stegosaur from the side.

Finally, discoveries of articulated Stegosaurus skeletons show that the spikes were actually horizontal from the ground, as opposed to held at an angle, as you can see in the outdated and incorrect picture below.

It's an interesting word, though, isn't it: "thagomizer."  It certainly doesn't sound like a very sciency name; in fact, when I first heard it, I immediately thought it sounded like something out of one of my favorite comic strips, Calvin and Hobbes, by Bill Watterson.  Well, if you thought that as well, then you were actually surprisingly close to the mark, as the term did in fact come from a comic strip, another one of my favorites: The Far Side.

The term wasn't used scientifically until the year 1993, at the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, by the one-time Curator of Paleontology at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science Ken Carpenter.  The name has been used multiple times since then, in different mediums; books and television shows (including another personal favorite, BBC's Planet Dinosaur), as well as places such as the Smithsonian Institution and Dinosaur National Monument.  Although an informal name, it is popular, and has amusing origins.

Gary Larson created a great number of hilarious The Far Side cartoons covering all sorts of topics.  However, it seems like a large number of them featured animals, or were in some way nature related.  You will undoubtedly see a great many of them in this blog as time goes on, but here are a few other amusing dinosaur ones.

Denver Zoo 7/20/2012

Ok, a little off topic, I know, but please, everyone reading this blog, go see the new Batman movie.  Words fail to describe it.  Now go.

OK, back on topic.  Yesterday, a couple of friends and I visited the Denver Zoo and the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.  While I had already seen their new Toyota Elephant Passage, I did get to see a couple of things that I didn't get to last time, some of them not actually at the Elephant Passage.  Although some of the pictures are not very good at all, I would still like to share a few with you.  One of the most exciting things of the day was the new Amur leopard cub that was born recently.  With only around 30 individuals remaining in the wild, the Amur leopard inhabits the Primorye region of southeastern Russia, and is labeled "Critically Endangered" by the IUCN.  unfortunately, all of my pictures of it were terrible.  I didn't get to see the clouded leopard (JUST LIKE LAST TIME.  DARN), but I did get to see the fishing cat!  Native to Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, the fishing cat is definitely one of my favorite animals.  So here are some pictures, enjoy! 

Elephant demonstration

Asian elephant catching lemons in its mouth.

The "Endangered" fishing cat.  Unfortunately, I didn't get to see the clouded leopard again, just like last time.  Darn. 

Downtown on Dwellable

Eye Shine....What Is It?

Eyeshine is a very common occurence amongst nocturnal animals.  Have you ever tried to take a picture of your dog and cat, but their eyes are glowing a very odd color?  Or you have been watching Animal Planet or another similar channel, and they show a night-vision scene, with the animals eyes glowing?  This is eye shine.  It is caused by a reflective layer in the eyeball, called the tapetum lucidum.

Tapetum lucidum in an armored dog

For nocturnal animals, seeing in the dark of night can be a problem.  Some animals counter this with extra large eyes.  This works well for nocturnal animals, sure: but think about in the morning, when you first wake up.  If someone comes into your room and just opens up the window shade, you might not be very happy, as your eyes generally need some time to adjust to the lighting conditions.  If you had gigantic eyes, this problem would be magnified even more.  So many animals that are active during both the night and the day have evolved something else; little mirrors in their eyes.

You can clearly see that the angle of tilt of the head makes the eyeshine much more intense in the left eye of this chubby cat

Here is essentially what happens.  When light hits our eyes, it is absorbed.  This gives us humans one chance to absorb the light that we can.  When light hits the eyes of, say, a dog or cat, or any other animal active at any time of the day, some of the light is absorbed, while some of the light is reflected back to the object the animal is viewing.  The light hits the object, and then bounces again back to the animal, giving it essentially a second chance to view the object.

Masiakasaurus knopfleri, and Other Interestingly Named Creatures

A few months ago, while reading Dr. Scott Sampson's book Dinosaur Odyssey (you probably know him as the guy from Dinosaur Train), he has a very brief section of his book where he talks about some interesting scientific names of sometimes not that interesting of creatures.  He presents nine of them, and here I present them to you, as well.

1.  Masiakasaurus knopfleri
This dinosaur, from Late Cretaceous Madagascar, was named by Scott Sampson and his colleagues, means the "vicious lizard of Knopfler," meaning Mark Knopfler, a famous musician.

 2.  Milesdavis zlichovianus
This trilobite was named after the famous jazz musician Miles Davis.

3.  Mozartella beethoveni
This wasp was named after two famous classical musicians, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven.

4.  Dicrotenipes thanatogratus
This one is probably less obvious to most of you out there, but in Greek, thanatos means "dead" (think Thanos, the villain for the next "Avengers" movie from Marvel: he loves and worships death), and in Latin, gratus means "grateful."  This midge was named after the famous band, Grateful Dead.

5.  Montypythonoides riversleighensis
This extinct Australian snake was named after the Monty Python franchise, but unfortunately, the name is now outdated; its correct scientific name now is Morelia riversleighensis.

6.  Strigiphilus garylarsoni
Named after the famed cartoonist Gary Larson of The Far Side fame (watch for at least one post featuring him next week).  Besides having this owl louse named after him, also has had a beetle and a butterfly named in his honor. Regarding the owl louse, he said “I considered this an extreme honor. Besides, I knew no one was going to write and ask to name a new species of swan after me. You have to grab these opportunities when they come along.”

7.   Ninjemys oweni
"Owen's Ninja Turtle" is named after the famous group, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and was found in Pleistocene-aged rocks in Queensland, Australia.

8.  Gozillus

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0425/Mysterious-Godzillus-fossil-find-stumps-scientists

9.  Darthvaderum greensladeae
One of my personal favorites, this mite was named after the famous Darth Vader, from Star Wars.

What Is It? The Weekly Challenge #2 Answer

 Hello again!  Thank you to our guessers for this week: surprisingly, one of you got it exactly right!  Congratulations to Kristie C., who guessed this weeks mystery animal 100% correct!  The correct animal was Pakicetus, an ancient ancestor of the cetaceans, or the whales, dolphins and porpoises.  Around 53 MYA, Pakicetus lived in a world that was gradually becoming what we see today.  At this time, what we now know as India was its own special island continent, moving steadily northwards until, eventually, India crashed into Asia.  This crash resulted in the largest mountains we have today, the Himalayas. 

However, 53 MYA, during the Eocene Epoch, India hadn't quite reached Asia, a small sea separating the two, the remains of the vast Tethys Ocean.  The Tethys Sea was high in saline, which is incredibly good for life.  Microscopic organisms like plankton flourished, sending reverberations up the food chain, all of the way to the fish, which exploded in numbers as well.  And on the shore of this Tethys Sea, in what today is Pakistan, stood Pakicetus. 

As Pakicetus watched the gread abundnace of fish in the waters, he began to take short fishing trips into the water.  Over millennia, as Pakicetus took more and more fishing trips, of longer and longer duration, adaptations that proved beneficial for hunting fish in the water occurred, like a more streamlined shape, most likely webbed feet, and nostrils placed further back on the head.  Over a few million years, Pakicetus evolved into another ancient whale, called Ambulocetus.

Check back in a few hours for your next "What Is It?" challenge?  I promise you, after the last two, this one should seem like a piece of cake!  See you all then!