Amazing animals abound around the world

Mallard

Walking around a lake on a cold, windy day, you’re bundled up and comfortable enough – but those crazy ducks in the water are diving below the surface, practically doing hand-stands, then paddling around as if it were a summer afternoon.  When a few of them head for the bank, you think they’re finally getting smart, but they just bob in the shallows for a while before heading back out to the middle.

Crazy ducks?  Not really.  They’re ducks, not humans, and ducks don’t react to  cold winter water the way we do.  Assuming they’d behave as we would is called anthropomorphism, or “the attribution of human characteristics, emotions, and behaviors to animals or other non-human things (including objects, plants, and supernatural beings).”

That means right now during the nor’easter battering us with snow and wind gusts, I shouldn’t be worrying about how squirrels and birds deal with such weather.  Unlike me, they don’t need to be inside, looking out.  (Right?  I do hope they’re OK, with living quarters so much more exposed to the elements.)

A day like this, happily home-bound, allows lounging, reading and thinking about animals I’ve encountered recently . . .

·       *     The raccoon who squatted on our deck table earlier this winter, happily eating all the snacks left there for squirrels and birds.  S/he looked ginormous as I peeked through the blinds to see what Harry had been so agitated about.  The overhead light prompted the freeloader to move on, and since then I haven’t been so generous with treats there.

A naturalist friend told me later that raccoons are omnivores and will eat almost anything. They don't hibernate, but if it gets extremely cold for a few days in a row, they may hole up in their dens (usually a hollow tree), but they may use a cave, or "borrow" another animal's burrow.

Najin & Fatu, the last 2                     NYT pic      

*     Northern white rhinos on the brink of extinction.  A mother and daughter, Najin and Fatu (“Say their names!”), live a heavily guarded life in Kenya because they are the last of their kind, and when they go, that is the end.  Peaceful creatures who “once flourished across Asia and North America, Africa and Europe,” they have been reduced to this state by human hunting and habitat loss. 

Wanting to “understand what we are destroying,” Sam Anderson visited the two rhinos and wrote about them in “A Mother and Daughter at the End.”  It’s very sad.  https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/06/magazine/the-last-two-northern-white-rhinos-on-earth.html?action=click&module=RelatedLinks&pgtype=Article

*     The platypus, a most unusual mammal, native to Australia.  “What other animal has a rubbery bill, ankle spikes full of venom, luxurious fur that glows under black light and a tendency to lay eggs?”  I first encountered the creature in a Patrick O’Brian maritime novel whose hero is (excruciatingly) stung by a male platypus’s poisonous spur. 

 https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/science/platypus-genome-echidna.html?campaign_id=34&emc=edit_sc_20210112&instance_id=25911&nl=science-times&regi_id=20760274&segment_id=49049&te=1&user_id=a360dad7b26df61ea65737080d3deedd

*     The African crested rat: the world’s only known toxic rodent.  Kinda cute, maybe, but deadly, this creature nibbles from a poison arrow tree, then spits chunks back out onto his   fur.  It’s poisonous enough “to bring an elephant to its knees,” and curious dogs who survive go to pains to avoid the rat.  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/25/science/african-crested-rat-poison.html?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20201126&instance_id=24498&nl=the-morning&regi_id=20760274&segmen

     

Harry 

*   Cat & his mats, much closer to home!  I’ve already mentioned our Harry and his mats and my frustration.  Now, though, I'm happy to report that he and they were taken care of, beautifully, at his vet’s, where he was brushed, combed, bathed and de-matted (at least for now).  And he came home loving himself!

This article in Catster cheered me up about “cat mats,” by reinforcing some of what I’ve learned lately. https://www.catster.com/cat-grooming/winter-cat-grooming-tips-to-help-kitty-through-the-cold-dry-months   

Give your pet(s) an extra hug and enjoy the snow!

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What animals are you meeting up with?  Tell us at1moreonce.blogspot.com