I can’t find a YouTube video at all so I can’t embed it, so I will just have to link to the site that has them.

Anyway, my friend sent me this video, and I just had to post it.

The music selection is odd. I wrote a song about moose once, and those who know what I’m talking about probably hate me now for bringing it up… It probably would have worked a little better for this video, besides the fact that it’s annoying and, well, I wrote it, if you can even call it writing. It’s essentially a line containing 12 words repeated over and over again.
This video is much better than my moose song though. The quality isn’t the best, and the music choice is odd, but how can you go wrong with three moose and a sprinkler?

I’ve been on a mission to post my favorite local bat, the Myotis evotis, but have so far been unable to find a picture that I like and have the rights to use. So I settled on a different local Myotis, the Myotis lucifugus. I do believe we caught some of these during the training I was on, though I don’t think I personally caught any (I mostly got evotis and volans).

Via Sophro’s photostream

I can’t help but wonder how they IDed them as Lucis, since lucifugus and californicus are pretty much indistinguishable.

Blue-tongued skinks are named after them.

Via Bill Hughes’s Flickr photostream.

Some rattlesnakes have them.

Via The Horned Jack Lizard’s Flickr photostream.

The members of giraffidae, the okapi and the giraffe, have them.

Via djhinrich Flickr photostream.

Via zeandroid’s Flickr photostream.

And it’s one of the most notable features of the chow chow.

Via budak’s Flickr photostream.

I doubt there is a common explanation for all instance of blue tongues. The Wikipedia article on Northern Blue-Tongued Skinks says that they “have a bright blue tongue that is often used to warn off or startle predators.” While it’s clear they’re not closely related at all, it seems like a plausible explanation for the rattlesnake as well, as their “rattles” are also used to warn off predators.

It’s hard to imagine that’s true for the members of giraffidae and the chow chow though, giraffes being so tall it’s difficult to imagine any predators even seeing the tongue, and dogs usually being predators not prey. The page on giraffes on the San Diego Zoo’s website says “some people think the color is to keep the tongue from getting sunburned,” which I guess might be possible, but it doesn’t seem to explain its relative the okapi, which I imagine wouldn’t have too much risk of getting sunburns, as its short enough to get shade from tree cover, and lives in the rainforest, where there often isn’t too much sunlight that reaches the ground anyway. I wasn’t able to find an explanation for the okapi’s tongue color, most sources were more interested in the fact that they were able to lick their own ears.

I wasn’t able to find an explanation for the chow chow either, but I imagine that it’s due to human controlled breeding.

My favorite explanation for all of these tongues though is that they just eat blueberries.

AP Photo

A deer with a single horn has been spotted in Italy. Quote from an AP story:

Single-horned deer are rare but not unheard of — but even more unusual is the central positioning of the horn, experts said.

“Generally, the horn is on one side (of the head) rather than being at the center. This looks like a complex case,” said Fulvio Fraticelli, scientific director of Rome’s zoo. He said the position of the horn could also be the result of a trauma early in the animal’s life.

(Why does Yahoo! News have an “Animals and Insects” sections?)

Yahoo! News story link.
Via BoingBoing!.

I plan to change web hosts today, if anything weird happens, that is probably why! If all goes well, there won’t be a thing to notice but faster page loads!

Edit: I’m sorry for all the trouble this has caused! I have decided to move back. I guess this was another learning experience???

I really like subterranean animals, but there are so few good pictures! I was surprised to find out that these moles were alive after the photographer found them while gardening. They look so vulnerable!

(I’m getting better at predicting what taxa an animal may belong to, but for the first time in a while, I still had to look up the superorder of a mammal, I wasn’t sure if moles were Euachontoglires, the superorder that includes rodents and primates and their allies, or Laurasiatherians, which is composed of, among other things, bats, carnivorans (cats, dogs, walruses, etc), pangolins, and ungulates), or if they were a member of a completely different superorder. It turns out they are a member of Laurasiatheria, in the order Soricomorpha (which also include shrews and the rare solenodon), which seems to mean they’re more closely related to whales, bears, and bats than any mouse. WELL, NOW I KNOW THAT.)

Via Tracy Lee Carroll’s Flickr photostream.

The title the photographer gave this tapir was “sing a song.” If it is making a sound, I wish I could hear it! I love tapirs but have no idea what they sound like. I think it looks more like the tapir is just taking a breath after a refreshing drink though.

Via Suneko’s Flickr photostream.