Well, that was interesting. Not exactly a dinner table topic. I thought the picture was bad enough, but the mental image of the infants literally sticking their heads up their mom's butt for nutrition. LOL.
Seriously, thanks for expanding my knowledge of the range of animal behavior.
Fascinating! I am quite happy to be in the category of mammal, but if those little amphibians were capable of opinions, they might find our way of caring for young to be equally distasteful 😊
As soon as I heard this news, my first thought was, "Heather will be talking about this soon, can't wait." Thank you for such a nice summary, and for everything you do!
You have a way of providing education and amusement simultaneously, a gift that helps unscientific people like me learn something new with pleasure. Thanks!
This is fascinating, if a bit gross. Admittedly, most westerners create something of a blind spot about milk. Not sure that it would be as popular if we had to think too hard about what it is and where it comes from. But more importantly it is just another demonstration of how "life finds a way". The most important efforts any living organisms make are to stay alive followed closely by reproduction. There is evidence for multi-cellular life forms in the pre-Cambrian that don't seem to have left any descendants as most of the Burgess Shale biota don't seem have done, despite very early forms that do seem to have left descendants. It would seem that failure and takeover of their habitats by more successful forms is the story of most life on Earth. Human ancestors don't seem to have been particularly numerous or terribly successful before the Holocene and the invention of horticulture. Our species had an unusually quick rise and one may suspect that our fall could be similarly quick on the planetary timescale. Especially as we become so "civilized" that only our technology supports the 8 billion souls on this little ball in space. This long view of the human race is not a terribly comforting one. I prefer to focus on the more immediate. That is probably the same for most of us. People whose training and intersts encompass ideas that dwarf human existence have to compartmentalize to get through the day.
Everytime I watch Bret and Heather's podcast, I wish that I could've been in at least one of their classes at Evergreen. How lucky their students were to have been able to learn from them, and how lucky we are that they both continue to teach with every podcast and writing.
After this one, I had to find a video of these creatures; they are amazing and a little horrifying all at once. "Simple inoffensive earthworms they are not."
I, too, could not resist a purported grainy, disgusting video recommended by Heather.
I first learned the word "cloaca" when I wanted to talk about the fact that my chickens have cloacas. (You might know that chicken fact.) I wanted to discuss this with my friend who is Mexican. She recognized the word (same spelling in Spanish), but she was pretty sure it was pronounced co-LA-ca in Mexican, which is often her reasoning, chula.
If the medical community becomes privy to this and has its way, the caecilians will all be put on 80mg of Lipitor daily. Warehouse medicine dictates this!
This was a very interesting piece even though the subjects themselves are squishy rather than cute and maybe even furry.
Well, that was interesting. Not exactly a dinner table topic. I thought the picture was bad enough, but the mental image of the infants literally sticking their heads up their mom's butt for nutrition. LOL.
Seriously, thanks for expanding my knowledge of the range of animal behavior.
Fascinating! I am quite happy to be in the category of mammal, but if those little amphibians were capable of opinions, they might find our way of caring for young to be equally distasteful 😊
As soon as I heard this news, my first thought was, "Heather will be talking about this soon, can't wait." Thank you for such a nice summary, and for everything you do!
You have a way of providing education and amusement simultaneously, a gift that helps unscientific people like me learn something new with pleasure. Thanks!
This is fascinating, if a bit gross. Admittedly, most westerners create something of a blind spot about milk. Not sure that it would be as popular if we had to think too hard about what it is and where it comes from. But more importantly it is just another demonstration of how "life finds a way". The most important efforts any living organisms make are to stay alive followed closely by reproduction. There is evidence for multi-cellular life forms in the pre-Cambrian that don't seem to have left any descendants as most of the Burgess Shale biota don't seem have done, despite very early forms that do seem to have left descendants. It would seem that failure and takeover of their habitats by more successful forms is the story of most life on Earth. Human ancestors don't seem to have been particularly numerous or terribly successful before the Holocene and the invention of horticulture. Our species had an unusually quick rise and one may suspect that our fall could be similarly quick on the planetary timescale. Especially as we become so "civilized" that only our technology supports the 8 billion souls on this little ball in space. This long view of the human race is not a terribly comforting one. I prefer to focus on the more immediate. That is probably the same for most of us. People whose training and intersts encompass ideas that dwarf human existence have to compartmentalize to get through the day.
Everytime I watch Bret and Heather's podcast, I wish that I could've been in at least one of their classes at Evergreen. How lucky their students were to have been able to learn from them, and how lucky we are that they both continue to teach with every podcast and writing.
After this one, I had to find a video of these creatures; they are amazing and a little horrifying all at once. "Simple inoffensive earthworms they are not."
I, too, could not resist a purported grainy, disgusting video recommended by Heather.
I first learned the word "cloaca" when I wanted to talk about the fact that my chickens have cloacas. (You might know that chicken fact.) I wanted to discuss this with my friend who is Mexican. She recognized the word (same spelling in Spanish), but she was pretty sure it was pronounced co-LA-ca in Mexican, which is often her reasoning, chula.
🤔interesting, but also 🤮
If the medical community becomes privy to this and has its way, the caecilians will all be put on 80mg of Lipitor daily. Warehouse medicine dictates this!
This was a very interesting piece even though the subjects themselves are squishy rather than cute and maybe even furry.