Beautiful Animals

Follow me.I know where they keep the catnip....

http://i1001.photobucket.com/albums/af138/barrythemod/To%20Forward/541974_376828245707293_102532049803.jpg

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http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/6048/puppiej.jpg

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

Edit: btw Barry The Mod those kitties are cute!

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@Barry The Mod,

What is that photo? I've been to Modena, not that I know a lot.

Please don't send teasers, give more info.

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@ossobuco,

Sorry Osso,this was all over our news channels....
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/325659
5.8-magnitude quake hits Modena, Parma & Bologna, Italy

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@trying2learn,

Barry, An earthquake? Glad the dogs were able to help. Glad they're getting to rest. Hard work. Dem kittens are very, very, very cute. Yes, three veries. I know cute when I see it. Thanks, kid.

t2l, I've been overcutified. Send the paramedics! What a wonderful picture. Thanks for posting it.

American bison, cow and calf:

http://www.carolglazerphotography.com/Carol_glazer_sales/bin/images/large/American_Bison_Cow_and_Calf_3.jpg

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I decided to post something about animal camouflage. Here are tawny frogmouths sitting in a tree:

http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/media-live/photos/000/246/cache/tawn-frogmouths-myall-tree-3_24669_600x450.jpg

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Siku the Polar Bear Cub:

http://i.huffpost.com/gadgets/slideshows/211427/slide_211427_730947_huge.jpg?1330372231

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@Roberta,

Quote:

American bison

That's real an odd name, isn't it, Roberta, for a country that sought to drive these animals to extinction, in an effort to drive Native Americans to extinction.

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@JTT,

snood, I don't suppose it's a good idea to have a polar bear cub as a pet. Sigh. Life has too many restrictions. Thanks for the great pic.

JTT, I ain't getting political on this thread. In fact I don't get political on any threads. I will say that human beings have been slaughtering animals without regard to extinction for as long as the first smartass figured out to make use of a rock and a club.

Native American humans? A discussion for another thread, maybe. We can look back on that part of our history and be ashamed.

California condor (making a comeback):

http://www.the9billion.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/california-condor.jpg

American alligator taking care of her kid. This species has made a successful comeback:

http://cdn2.arkive.org/media/FD/FDB723E6-DA91-4379-9517-4EC0AB9805E3/Presentation.Large/Female-American-alligator-carrying-young.jpg

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@Roberta,

Quote:

I will say that human beings have been slaughtering animals without regard to extinction for as long as the first smartass figured out to make use of a rock and a club.

I agree, Roberta, except that no one has ever done it in near as hypocritical a fashion.

Back to the beautiful animals.

I got cow **** on my hands today. Maybe that doesn't mean much to city slickers [no pejorative meaning intended] but it was grand.

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@Roberta,

I was in bison country last week, and will post some pictures next week. Most were in Wyoming and Yellowstone National Park.

A little trivia on bisons; Americans slayed bisons for their skins, and to rid the Lakota and Cheyenne of their primary source of food and shelter to take over their land. At one time, they numbered less than 1,000, but through private breeding and shelter, they now number over 400,000. Kevin Costner became enamored with the old west, bisons, and Native Americans, when he made "Dancing with Wolves" and have invested to develop Tatanka (the story of the bison), and operates a casino and restaurant in Deadwood, South Dakota - where some in our travel group had lunch.

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If you love dogs OR cats, you GOTTA see this...

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@snood,

Sweet. Very patient doggie.

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http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/media-live/photos/000/485/cache/fluttering-stingless-bee_48524_600x450.jpg

Cheating Bees

Photograph by Dino Martins

It turns out that in nature there are lots of cheaters. Here a tiny stingless bee waits patiently on an eggplant flower as a Nomia bee approaches. The Nomia bee has the capability and strength to buzz pollinate this specialized flower. This involves the bee holding the flower in its "teeth" (mandibles) and vibrating it at a specific frequency using its wing muscles. Only then is pollen released. As the stingless bee is too puny to do this, it simply waits and then steals pollen that spills out after the Nomia bee has buzzed the flower.

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@cicerone imposter,

I understand that at it's peek in North America there were 30-50 million bison. Thank heavens there has been a resurgance of the breed. Still the wild bison is very rare creature. Most are located on managed ranches or refuges of some sort.

Interesting bison factoids:
"Bison were described as having "wild and ungovernable temper"; they can jump 6 feet vertically, and can run 35–40 mph (56–64 kph) when agitated. In combination with their weight, that makes bison herds difficult to confine, because they can jump over or crash through almost any fence."

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@snood,

Big smiles from an owner of Border Collie (and a former Cat herder).

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@Ragman,

Quote:

Still the wild bison is very rare creature.

Very rare indeed, Ragman.

Quote:

But one obstacle is not so well known: The West, it turns out, has almost no wild, genetically pure bison left.

Parsing bison DNA

The genetic crisis began in the 19th century, when market hunters nearly destroyed North America’s bison, reducing an original population of about 60 million to a few hundred. As a result of other conservation efforts on public land, and a boom in bison ranching, the population has now rebounded to roughly 500,000. But the number is deceiving. Almost all modern bison are managed for commodity purposes, particularly meat production (HCN, 6/8/98: Don't fence me in). Bison that act wild, jumping fences or defending calves, are typically culled from those herds, says Cormack Gates, a University of Calgary associate professor who heads the World Conservation Union’s Bison Specialist Group. Commodity bison are also bred to have bigger rumps and smaller humps than wild bison, "trying to produce better meat for the stores, which really has nothing to do with the ongoing evolution of the animals, but rather, the evolution of profit margins," Gates says.

http://www.hcn.org/issues/321/16267/print_view

And,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_Cave_bison_herd

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