Mammal News Roundup

Well, I was going to post a new mammal drawing today, which would have brought us to six consecutive days! But alas, I decided to pick tonight to try out a new paper (I was going to try to find a more archival replacement for my usual tracing paper) and, well, it's just not working out for me. So instead, here's an installment of the Mammal News Roundup.

May 28, 2008, The Guardian: Jane Goodall, a hero to mammals including me and my friend Tynan, is proposing that the Nobel Prize committee add a new prize, "for advancing medical knowledge without experimentation on animals." I absolutely agree that, at the very least, we could drastically cut back on how often we experiment on animals now that we have amazing scientific technology and that we should actively recognize and reward new ways of doing science that don't involve harming animals, but a Nobel Prize for such a niche seems like it would not quite fit in with the others.

June 23, 2008, CNN.com: The U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case regarding whether or not it's okay for the Navy to disregard the welfare of whales when it's performing sonar tests. Despite evidence showing, apparently, that whales, dolphins, and other marine mammals can be injured or killed by military sonar, President Bush tried to create an exemption that would allow the tests to be conducted without an environmental impact assessment. Courts up to the Supreme Court have sided with the whales.

On the other hand, the court isn't going to hear a case about the proposed fence along the U.S.-Mexican border, meaning that the law that gives "the secretary of homeland security the power to bypass laws or regulations prohibiting the fence's construction" stands. A law that gives someone the power to break the law is an interesting law indeed. This is an issue I feel very strongly about, but I'm not going to start ranting about it right now.

June 24, 2008, NewScientist.com: A study suggests that piglets—being raised for their meat—who get to listen to music and play in their own rec room are less stressed. The piglets in the study listened to music by Bach and Elgar, chosen for its resemblance to porcine grunts! Less stress for pigs means better pork for humans.

June 20, 2008, The Guardian: The demilitarized zone between North and South Korea was once farmland. Now that it's been left to its own devices, endangered animals have been quite successfully making their homes there. But the DMZ isn't likely to stay natural and wild for long, since development and industry are encroaching, so a group wants to have the zone declared an official nature reserve: the most dangerous nature reserve in the world, according to this article. The article is accompanied by a slide show about the wildlife of Korea's DMZ.

Photograph by Scott Bauer, United States Department of Agriculture

Warthog (Phacochoerus aethiopicus)

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I need to go to bed, so I won't say too much about warthogs, except that they live in Africa south of the Sahara and can go for months without water. And they dig holes to hang out in, keeping themselves warm when it's cold out and cool when it's hot.

The Wonders of Animal Life books I mentioned in my mountain lion post include a full-page color photograph of a warthog in the "Nature's Strange Show of Freaks" chapter. Isn't that mean? It gets even meaner. The caption reads thusly:

WARTHOG, A TUSKED AND SNOUTED FREAK OF THE AFRICAN WILD With grotesquely curving tusks, the hideous warts below the eyes which give this wild hog its name, and a draggle of coarse hair on head and back, this animal is indeed one of Nature's freaks. The skin is as cracked as dried mud and the typical pig eyes, small and evil-shining, add to the generally grotesque and repulsive mien. The warts below the eyes may serve to protect them during the battles between the boars.

Evil-shining eyes? A repulsive mien? Preposterous!

Consecutive days of mammals: 5
Record: 16

Great Stripe-Faced Bat (Vampyrodes caraccioli)

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I chose this bat completely at random from among all the mammals with species accounts in Mammalian Species. It's a leaf-nosed Central and South American bat, and it's frugivorous, another wonderful adjective from the world of biology: it eats fruit. The great stripe-faced bat enjoys a veritable tropical fruit salad, dining on papayas, figs, and bananas that it forages for in the forest canopy. In fact, this bat, along with other frugivorous bat species, is a very important spreader of fruit-tree seeds.

Consecutive days of mammals: 4
Record: 16

Various Voles (Macrotus spp.)

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Clockwise from the top left, say hello to a California vole (Microtus californicus), a Mediterranean pine vole (Microtus duodecimcostatus), a Japanese grass vole (Microtus montebelli), and a Mexican vole (Microtus mexicanus).

Voles are little mouselike rodents that burrow around in many kinds of environments. The four shown here have nothing in common, as far as I know, other than the fact that they each have a place name in their common name. Walker's Mammals of the World has a couple of interesting things to say about the voles of the Microtus genus:

In general the social life of Microtus is something of an enigma. A number of species are known to live in what appear to be colonies of hundreds of individuals. The animals therein, however, may be totally uncooperative and extremely aggressive toward one another.

That reminds me a bit of some Homo sapiens families I know. Walker's also says:

…Microtus appears to be slow-moving, docile, and easily trapped and tamed. When upset these voles may emit a high-pitched squeak, gnash their teeth, and either flee or freeze depending upon their location and previous activity.

Poor upset voles! Here on YouTube you can see a not-noticeably-distressed captive Japanese grass vole working on his nest.

Consecutive days of mammals: 3
Record: 16

Mountain Lion (Felis concolor)

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I want to tell you about these amazing old books I recently acquired. A couple of weeks ago, my mom and I went to our local "indoor flea market." I happened across this old hardbound green book called Wonders of Animal Life, volume four. It's one of those great old 1920s or 1930s books with the copperplate photo captions and tinted plates for illustrations and lots and lots of black-and-white photos. I fell so in love with volume four that I had to hunt down the rest of the series, and through AbeBooks.com, I found someone selling volumes 1–3. What luck! They arrived today and they're just as wonderful as volume 4.

The series comprises essays by various scientists and other kinds of experts. There's no rhyme or reason to their selection or to their arrangement, as far as I can tell. Topics include "Strange Tails and Their Many Uses," "Gluttons of the Sea," "Long Necks and Short Necks," "The Gamut of Sound in the Insect World," The Wonderful Wanderings of Animals," "Nature's Strange Show of Freaks," "Is Evolution Still Going On?," and, most pertinent to today's Daily Mammal post, "The Mystery of the Puma" by Hamilton Fyfe.

Mr. Fyfe is a gentleman not unlike our beloved Ivan T. Sanderson, the Daily Mammal's patron saint. A war correspondent and political propagandist, a practicer of what he termed vagabondage, a man about town with an opinion on everything, Mr. Fyfe here expounds on the puma, also known as the catamount, the cougar, the panther, the painter, or the mountain lion. After explaining that the puma's favorite food is horseflesh, he states that "it will not attack or even in some circumstances defend itself from the human race…due to some unexplained influence which the human race seems to have upon it." Fyfe continues, "This influence is strong enough to make the puma…run from man, and even sit unresisting and trembling while man deals it a death-blow." According to Fyfe, "the natives of South America" refer to the puma as el amigo del cristiano, the friend of the Christian, and "it has actually been known to volunteer its services as a protector of man."

A photograph of a puma accompanying the essay is captioned "ONLY WILD ANIMAL THAT IS FRIENDLY TO MAN" and informs that "when confronted by man it usually seems to behave like a large and friendly cat. A wild puma will purr in the presence of man and even rub itself against his legs. But apart from this it has the pleasing habit of playing for hours by itself in the midst of the desert at hide-and-seek or at chasing butterflies."

Now, I know that pumas avoid man whenever possible. In my life as a citizen of the western United States, I've seen bobcats, coyotes, and bears, but never a mountain lion. Whether this is due to some magical influence man has over the species, I don't know, but Fyfe is correct that they avoid us. That makes it particularly unlikely that they really volunteer their services as bodyguards or that they like to rub up against people's legs, purring, and it's hard to imagine them cowering in acceptance when dealt a death blow. Maybe in South America that's true, but it's hard to imagine.

While mountain lion attacks on people have always been quite rare, they have increased rather alarmingly in recent decades. A month ago, a large animal that may or may not have been a mountain lion attacked a five-year-old boy in the Sandia Mountains here in Albuquerque. As we humans move closer and closer to the homes of other animals, as we do things that make it harder for them to feel safe and find food and live their lives, we experience more encounters of all kinds with wild animals. It would be nice if they all rubbed up against our legs and purred and protected us and chased butterflies with us. I bet they think it would be nice if we just left them alone.

Consecutive days of mammals:2
Previous record: 16

Common Eland (Taurotragus oryx)

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Elands (of which there are two species, this one and the giant eland, which isn't actually any more giant than this one, although this one is a bit more common than the giant one) are huge antelopes that live in Africa. Because they have very nutritious milk and decent meat and useful hides, people have tried, with varying success, to domesticate them as ranch animals. Overhunting is a threat to the eland, but it's not in dire straits just yet.

Consecutive days of mammals: 1
Previous record: 16

Ground Pangolin (Manis temminckii)

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This walking pinecone is a member of one of Africa's three pangolin species. Born with soft scales that harden within a few days, baby pangolins ride around on their mother's tail and start eating termites instead of nursing on pangolin milk when they're a few months old. Pangolins can't see very well, but they can hear and smell really well (notice I didn't say that they smell good). Since they're covered in hard scales, I'd guess their sense of touch isn't tops, either, but I can't tell you about their sense of taste.

Ground pangolins roll in a ball to escape danger, and they're nearly impossible to unroll. They can move their scales, and in fact they have to move them to clean under them, using their claws to scratch out the gunk and their tongues to eat the delicious bugs they find tucked away under there.

Pangolin scales and skin are used in medicine and in making trinkets and jewelry and cowboy boots. Hyenas and leopards prey on pangolins and sometimes they get caught up in brush fires or zapped by electric fences. They're shy creatures snuffling through the world, and more vulnerable than they look.

Consecutive days of mammals: 1
Previous record: 16

Rock Hyrax (Procavia capensis)

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These funny fellows are rock hyraxes, furry little scurrying, jumping guys that live in the desert in Africa and the Middle East. See the teeth on the one on the left? Those are thought to be remants, evolution-wise, of tusks, as the hyrax is related to the elephant (and to manatees).

The rock hyrax lives in herds of several dozen, and they tend to all use the bathroom in the same spot. Well! Their urine is "glutinous," and when it's sitting out on a rock in the sun (and, depending on who you ask mixing with their feces), the whole mess becomes kind of stickily crystallized into a solid mass. Then it's called hyraceum and is used to make medicine and perfume.

Rock hyraxes are mentioned in the Bible, where they're called conies in many translations. In the book of Proverbs (30:24–28) there's a list of things that are small but wise. Conies are "creatures of little power, yet they make their home in the crags."

Consecutive days of mammals: 5
Previous record: 16

Eastern Barred Bandicoot (Perameles gunnii)

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The eastern barred bandicoot is a critically endangered Australian marsupial. Animal Diversity Web says there are only about 300–400 of them alive in the wild. They eat mainly insects and worms, along with some berries and grasses and such. They're noisy and they leap along the ground.

Consecutive days of mammals: 4
Record: 16

Common Treeshrew (Tupaia glis)

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Common treeshrews live in the rain forests of Thailand, Sumatra, Java, and thereabouts. Their generic name, Tupaia, comes from a Malayan word that means squirrel. They have sharp claws and little ears and they rustle around in the trees, darting about looking for insects and leaves to gobble up. The treeshrews' place in the tree of life has been controversial; at times they've been placed in the Primates order. But the 20 treeshrew species are currently believed to be in their own order, Scandentia, which means we can mark one more order off the list!

Animal Diversity Web has some critical things to say about the common treeshrew's child-rearing techniques. The male of a monogamous treeshrew couple makes two nests for the family: one master bedroom for the parents and a separate suite for the babies. And the mother treeshrew neglects her offspring as much as she can without their actually dying. She goes to their nest only once every two days and nurses them for only 10 or 15 minutes at a time! In fact, if you add up all the time a mother treeshrew spends with her children while they're in the nest, it comes to only an hour and a half! It's so bad that treeshrew parents wouldn't even be able to identify their own offspring if they didn't mark their babies with the scents they produce from glands in their sternum and abdomen.

I don't mean to be judgmental, but maybe someone should call child protective services.

Consecutive days of mammals: 3
Record: 16

Chilean Shrew Opossum (Rhyncholestes raphanurus)

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The Chilean shrew opossum is an enigmatic little beast. We think it's solitary. But then again, we think it lives in small family groups. We think it has five or seven or so babies at a time, but who knows? It seems to be nocturnal, since the few that have been captured were captured at night. Nobody knows how long they live. How well they see. Where they live. We think they're vulnerable to extinction, but we don't really have a clue how many of them there are. I can tell you two things, though: Chilean shrew opossums like damp forests, and the adjective fossorial means burrowing.

Consecutive days of mammals: 2
Record: 16

Southern Marsupial Mole (Notoryctes typhlops)

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The southern marsupial mole is one of two species in the order Notoryctemorphia, one of the remaining mammalian orders that I hadn't drawn…until now! (After Notoryctemorphia, there are five more orders to cover. They're all drawn and waiting to meet you!)

Marsupial moles, which live in Australia, aren't at all related to moles; true moles aren't marsupials. But what's remarkable about these guys is how well they demonstrate the idea of convergent evolution, which is the phenomenon of organisms that aren't related nevertheless evolving very similar adaptations in response to similar environments. Its form is very similar to that of other moles that burrow in sandy soil, but it most resembles the golden mole, which lives in Africa and is also not really a mole!

The southern marsupial mole has vestigial eyes, which are little more than dots where you'd expect eyes to be. It has huge front claws for digging, a horny shield over its nose, and neck bones that are fused to stay rigid while it burrows. It leaves a triple track behind it after a rain thanks to its tail, which it swings back and forth, and its pouch opens rearwards to keep sand out.

You should watch this neat video on ARKive that shows a southern marsupial mole digging a burrow. It's mesmerizing to see how the sand closes up behind it, leaving almost no trace that it was there.

At one time, southern marsupial moles were heavily hunted for their silky blond pelts. Now, they're considered endangered, but nobody knows much about them, their range, or their population.

Happy birthday, Daily Mammal!

Today, June 3, is the Daily Mammal's first birthday! A few weeks ago, I posted a couple of goals I wanted to meet by today. And guess what! I met them! You wouldn't know, though, because I have six drawings of mammals in six orders that have never previously been seen on this site, but I haven't scanned and posted them yet. I hope I can start posting them this week.

So to recap, in the first year of the Daily Mammal, while I did not draw 366 mammals as would have been ideal, I did draw half a year's worth, coming in at about 185 species (plus a few repeated species due to mammalthon requests). And I managed to draw at least one species in every order of mammal, and since there are a few orders that contain only one species, they're officially retired—cross 'em off the list!

Speaking of lists, I'm going to start periodically making available an updated spreadsheet of all the mammal species that shows which I've already drawn. You can download the spreadsheet, which is in Excel format, by clicking here.

Thanks for supporting the Daily Mammal for the past year, and let's have another great year starting now! Only thirteen years to go…