BATTLEZOO - A blog about animals fighting.

Panda maims Chinese student

2008-11-22T07:35:00.000-08:00

The 20-year-old student had ignored warning signs and scaled a two-metre (6.5ft) barrier to get into the pen.
State media say the panda bit him on his arms and legs, and he had to be rescued by the animal's keepers.
Speaking from his hospital bed, the injured man said the panda had looked so cute he had just wanted to hug it.

People, how many times do we have to tell you? Animals are not cute or cuddly once they're big enough to maul you. Hippos will crush your bones, koalas will take your face off with their claws and pandas (being bears, after all) are just as inclined to kill you as you are to hug them. On the other hand, two meters is a pretty high fence, so this guy must have really wanted it. High five for following your dreams, Liu.

The article's winning sentence: "Keepers said [the panda] had recovered from the incident and was eating and playing as normal."

Nudibranchs

2008-11-16T15:22:00.001-08:00

Nudibranchs: Beautiful Animals You Never Knew About

I wouldn't suggest you actually read the text - the writing is so bad it might make you vomit your entrails like a sea cucumber (which, weirdly, aren't even in the same phylum as nudibranchs. so that joke doesn't work very well.). Just look at the photos.

Besides looking pretty, nudibranchs can do a lot of interesting things. Some of them eat hydrozoa (like jellyfish) and assimilate their stinging cells, and others eat plants and use the chloroplasts to photosynthesize food for themselves.

Pigeon vs. Child

2008-11-14T13:42:00.000-08:00

Marine Census Discovers New Species

2008-11-11T20:38:00.000-08:00

PHOTOS: New Deep-Sea Species Revealed by Marine Census

Remember the yeti crab? The ocean has so many horrible, terrifying things left to discover, it's amazing none of them have decided to kill us all.

Adorable baby pygmy hippopotamus; don't be fooled

2008-11-08T16:30:00.000-08:00

It IS true that the Taronga Zoo in Sydney's new baby pygmy hippopotamus is adorable. It is ALSO true that pygmy hippopotamuses are generally docile creatures that do well in captivity.

DO NOT BELIEVE YOU ARE SAFE. If you are unlucky enough to encounter a real hippopotamus and mistake it for a pygmy, you are as good as dead. Steve Irwin, the crocodile hunter, once said that a sequence he filmed with hippos was the most dangerous he'd ever done. Steve Irwin! If that's not enough to convince you to stay away, you should consider that "[t]o mark territory, hippos spin their tails while defecating to distribute their excrement over the greatest possible area."

Finally, in the grand tradition of Renaissance Europeans completely making shit up about "the Orient", here is a bizarre painting of humans and dogs fighting a hippo fighting a crocodile, or something, I don't even know. By Peter Paul Rubens (click to make it bigger):

The Dutch always do it weirder.

Pissed off Octopus Destroys Aquarium

2008-11-06T13:04:00.000-08:00

Otto the octopus wreaks havoc

A octopus has caused havoc in his aquarium by performing juggling tricks using his fellow occupants, smashing rocks against the glass and turning off the power by shortcircuiting a lamp.
[...]
Staff believe that the octopus called Otto had been annoyed by the bright light shining into his aquarium and had discovered he could extinguish it by climbing onto the rim of his tank and squirting a jet of water in its direction.
[...]
"Once we saw him juggling the hermit crabs in his tank, another time he threw stones against the glass damaging it. And from time to time he completely re-arranges his tank to make it suit his own taste better - much to the distress of his fellow tank inhabitants."

Octopi are disturbingly intelligent. They can open screw caps on jars, be trained like dogs and allegedly learn by simple observation. Some are able to change colors and movement patterns to mimic several different species, and apparently a few have even broken into the holds of fishing boats to eat their catch. Cephalopod intelligence isn't limited to octopi, either - some kinds of squid exhibit complex communication through color changes.

Nate Hill, Rogue Taxidermist

2008-11-05T10:17:00.000-08:00

"This is Nate. He loves dead stuff. Best of all, he loves making things from dead stuff."

Follow Nate as he builds an anatomically correct man out of dead animal parts, then goes to Chinatown to dig through the garbage for more. Nate, for some reason, seems to only wear naval clothing. This may be the strangest thing I've ever posted here.

From Diagonal View's Youtube channel, a treasury of bizarre documentaries for people with short attention spans.

Japanese Zoo Drill - Escaped Rhino!

2008-11-04T10:14:00.000-08:00

Japan is an extremely earthquake prone country, and a scenario where dangerous animals escape into downtown Tokyo isn't that far fetched (remember the confused Japanese macaque). Preparing for such an eventuality, staff at the Ueno Zoo hold regular drills to hone their pissed-off animal catching skills, and short of actually releasing rhinoceroses into the park the only way to do this is have people dress up like them.

Unrelated, but also interesting, from the Ueno Zoo's Wikipedia entry:

"Ueno Zoo's saddest time came during World War II. The Japanese Army ordered that all "wild and dangerous animals" at the zoo be killed, claiming that bombs could hit the zoo and escaping wild animals would wreak havoc in the streets of Tokyo. Requests by the staff at the zoo for a reprieve, or to evacuate the animals elsewhere, were refused. Ueno Zoo's three elephants at the time, John, Tonky, and Wanly (or Wang Lee) were too clever to eat the poisoned food, and thus were slowly starved to death. The fate of Ueno's animals, particularly the elephants, has often been used in Japan as an example of the evils of war."

There's also a scene in Haruki Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle where Japanese soldiers in Nanking kill all the animals in a zoo, and I suspect Europe has similar stories. War sucks!

Pet squirrel monkeys

2008-11-03T14:00:00.000-08:00

Mail-Order Friends: The Comic Book Squirrel Monkeys

Back in the 1970s, before there were things like AIDS, the internet and common sense, comic books across this great land advertised pet squirrel monkeys. One intrepid writer, George Khoury, managed to track down an account by someone who ordered one and relates his tale in this awesome but probably too long article.

"I grabbed it by its tail, and it came down on, starting literally up by my shoulder, like a drill press it landed on my arm, and every bite was breaking flesh. It was literally like an unsewing machine. It was literally unsewing my arm coming down, and I was pouring blood. I grabbed it by its neck with both my wrists, threw it back in the cage. It’s screaming like a scalded cat. I’m pouring blood. My friend’s laughing uncontrollably, and my father finally comes in the basement door and goes, ‘Jeffery! What are you doing to that rabbit?’ And I go, ‘It’s not a rabbit, it’s a monkey, and it just bit the hell out of me.’ ‘A monkey? Bring it up here!’ I’m pouring, I wrapped a t-shirt around my arm to stave off the bleeding, carried the cage upstairs, and I don’t know why I bothered sneaking it in, because they fell in love with it, and it was like, there was no problem at all. They took me to the emergency room and I got 28 stitches on my arm."

If only life today weren't quite so sanitized. From boingboing, of course.

Thieving Crow vs. Disappointed Wallaby

2008-11-02T21:43:00.001-08:00

oh nooooo :( :(

Squirrel found!

2008-11-02T15:05:00.000-08:00

Almost as good as:

Vampire moth evolution

2008-11-01T18:18:00.000-07:00

I missed the appropriate date for this one, but it's interesting anyway.

Vampire Moth Discovered -- Evolution at Work

"A previously unknown population of vampire moths has been found in Siberia. And in a twist worthy of a Halloween horror movie, entomologists say the bloodsuckers may have evolved from a purely fruit-eating species
[...]
When the Russian moths were experimentally offered human hands this summer, the insects drilled their hook-and-barb-lined tongues under the skin and sucked blood.

Weird, I'd never heard of these. Watching them drill into that lady's finger by rocking their head is a little unsettling.

That's not what's really interesting here though, and I think the article does a shitty job of explaining what is. Moths that feed on blood have been known for a while and there are at least three other species in the genus Calyptra that do (though there are many that do not) - the difference is that most C. thalictri populations generally only eat fruit. That means that, at some point in the recent past, the moths evolved the ability and inclination to eat animal blood.

Neat! Here's a video of what is presumably a different species in the same genus. I'm posting it mostly for this comment:

"its really his own fault 4 lying out in the open jungle.
No offence but how dumb.
if he wanted 2 avvoid this he shouldnt be sleepin their"

BBC's Wildlife Photographer of the Year

2008-11-01T14:42:00.000-07:00

Wildlife Photographer of the Year

I always wanted to be a wildlife photographer, roaming the exotic wilderness and searching for rare and unheard of creatures. Then I watched the segments after the credits on Planet Earth, in which the very same wildlife photographers freeze their asses off in the Gobi and sit in wet, disgusting jungles for weeks on end (specifically, I'm talking about the bactrian camel hunt and the one at the end of the birds of paradise episode, which I can't find online). This article further confirms my reservations: "Ten long months spent stalking the rare and elusive snow leopard in temperatures as low as -40ºC paid off for a dogged photographer."

Dog vs. Crab

2008-10-31T08:09:00.000-07:00

ellenegail's flickr

The Hyena and Other Men

2008-10-28T20:58:00.000-07:00

The Hyena and Other men

Pieter Hugo is a South African photographer. Last year, he published some photos of Nigera's 'Hyena Men'.

In Abuja we found them living on the periphery of the city in a shantytown - a group of men, a little girl, three hyenas, four monkeys and a few rock pythons. It turned out that they were a group of itinerant minstrels, performers who used the animals to entertain crowds and sell traditional medicines. The animal handlers were all related to each other and were practising a tradition passed down from generation to generation. I spent eight days travelling with them.

The internet is woefully lacking in information about all this, but the photographer has a write-up here. This is particularly poignant:

Many animal-rights groups also contacted me, wanting to intervene (however, the keepers have permits from the Nigerian government). When I asked Nigerians, "How do you feel about the way they treat animals", the question confused people. Their responses always involved issues of economic survival. Seldom did anyone express strong concern for the well-being of the creatures. Europeans invariably only ask about the welfare of the animals but this question misses the point. Instead, perhaps, we could ask why these performers need to catch wild animals to make a living. Or why they are economically marginalised. Or why Nigeria, the world's sixth largest exporter of oil, is in such a state of disarray.

Hyena fact time! "The female Spotted Hyena's urogenital system is unique among mammals; the female's clitoris is elongated to form a fully erectile phallus, and the vaginal opening is at the tip of this phallus. [...] The female urinates, mates and gives birth through this pseudo-penis."

Wikipedia of course also has an entry for pseudo-penis:"A pseudo-penis is a term used of any structure found on an animal that while superficially appearing to be a penis, is derived from a different developmental path." I know some people I could put into that category.

Eagle vs. goat

2008-10-26T19:56:00.000-07:00

This is like that video of that guy ski-gliding on the Eiger, if he hit a rock and died before being eaten.

Turkish Camel Wrestling

2008-10-19T11:37:00.000-07:00

From the deepest wilds of Turkey, it's camel wrestling!

"Camel wrestling is a sport in which two male Tülu camels wrestle in response to a female camel in heat being led before them. It is most common in the Aegean region of Turkey, but is also found in the Marmara and Mediterranean regions of that country. There are an estimated 1200 camel wrestlers (or Tulu) in Turkey, bred specially for the competitions."

Did you know that camels are retromingent, meaning that they piss backwards?

I'm David Attenborough, and I Hate Nature

2008-10-15T21:21:00.000-07:00

"I hate these koalas so much that I've taken the liberty of poisoning them. They may look peaceful, but I assure you, their death was exceedingly painful and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Hey look, a dick made of stone!"

The artichoke, by the way, is the extremely bizarre pangolin.

Peace dove vs. small children

2008-10-09T17:47:00.000-07:00

Crocodiles vs. Japanese soldiers

2008-10-06T16:47:00.000-07:00

On a darker note: Allied Reptiles

In February 1945, the British 14th Army had surrounded a mass of fleeing Japanese in a mangrove swamp in southern Burma. In the swamp were thousands of saltwater crocodiles, averaging 15 feet long, but the Japanese refused to surrender. The crisis came on the night of Feb. 19:

That night was the most horrible that any member of the [marine launch] crews ever experienced. The scattered rifle shots in the pitch black swamp punctured by the screams of wounded men crushed in the jaws of huge reptiles, and the blurred worrying sound of spinning crocodiles made a cacophony of hell that has rarely been duplicated on earth. At dawn the vultures arrived to clean up what the crocodiles had left. … Of about 1,000 Japanese soldiers that entered the swamps of Ramree, only about 20 were found alive.

That's the account of naturalist Bruce Wright. If it's accurate, this would be the worst crocodile attack — and indeed one of the deadliest animal attacks — in recorded history.

War is hell, but crocodiles are worse. Incidentally, saltwater crocodiles are the largest and meanest of all reptiles, growing up to eighteen feet long and weighing over a ton.

Again from Futility Closet.

Decapitated snake still alive

2008-10-05T19:50:00.000-07:00

I think we've all heard that you should be wary of snake bites even after you've chopped off the head (or, you know, you shouldn't chop off a snake's head), but I don't think I've ever actually seen why. This is pretty bizarre.

what

2008-10-04T11:47:00.000-07:00

Zoo rampage!

2008-10-04T10:07:00.000-07:00

Boy fed zoo reptiles to crocodile

A seven-year-old boy has been filmed going on the rampage at a popular zoo in Australia, killing rare reptiles and feeding live ones to a crocodile.
Footage from the security cameras at Alice Springs Reptile Centre caught the child smiling as he killed a total of 13 animals.
During his 30-minute spree, he was seen hurling the animals over the security fence into the crocodile enclosure.
...
"The fact a seven-year-old can wreak so much havoc in such a short time, it's unbelievable," he told Reuters news agency.

You know, when you think about it, it's not really.

Grey heron vs. Rabbit

2008-10-02T21:16:00.000-07:00

Grey heron eats entire rabbit alive

Dude, nature is cruel. Nature doesn't give a shit about your 'aesthetic values' or 'spirituality' or any of that other crap you figured out after watching An Inconvenient Truth. It's going to go ahead and let big ugly things eat cute little things, because nature is a compete bastard.

holy shit

what

somebody lolcat that last one

How to Field Dress a Moose

2008-10-02T13:14:00.001-07:00

There's been a lot of talk about Sarah Palin's ability to "field dress" a moose, and how this somehow qualifies her to take all my money. I, along with everyone else who has never shot anything out of a helicopter, have no idea what this means. To google!

oh.

um.

eugh.

Instead of putting the moose in an elegant gown and sending it off to a moosey ballroom, field dressing is actually slicing it open and removing all the internal organs with a knife and your bare hands. Take a look at the steps listed here:

Clear Your Working Area
Bleed The Animal
Preparatory Skin Cuts, Throat to Anus
Break the Breastbone
Sever the Wind Pipe and Gullet from the Head
Open the Abdomen to the Anus
Split the Pelvic Bone
Cut the Diaphragm from the Cavity Wall
Free the Anus and Bladder
Roll Out The Abdominal Organs with Anus Attached
Remove the Neck and Chest Cavity Organs
Clean the Body Cavity
Prepare the Carcass for Cooling or Quartering

I don't even know what to say about this other than the word anus is on this page sixteen times. I'm pretty sure there's nothing about anuses in any study of American values, and I'm now a little afraid of the people who identify with Sarah Palin more because she knows how to split the pelvic bone of a dead moose.

I bet she's not even very good at it.

p.s. holy shit even the New Hampshire government's website tells you how to kill a moose how does everybody but me know this stuff

Tom Selleck vs. Macaw

2008-09-24T17:23:00.000-07:00

This is a clip of Tom Selleck, as Magnum, P.I., being attacked by an irate macaw. That's all it is.

Or is it? The depth of emotion carried in the elderly woman's shouts of Merlin!, T.C's remorseless, stone-hearted reaction to the helpless bird's murder, the dash of international intrigue and suspense of a handgun standoff... truly, this clip has the potential to become a television classic, revered for generations.

Though the complexity of this episode must raise many questions in the viewer's mind, perhaps the most baffling is what the hell is that noise you are making, higgins

Monkeys in film

2008-09-24T07:13:00.000-07:00

List of films with monkeys in them is a deleted Wikipedia page. The list, in its entirety, reads
King Kong- was a gorilla but monkey family
Dunsten checks in- Orangatan part of monkey family
King Kong vs Godzilla- fictional mechanical gorilla
Incomplete and clearly written by someone with a poor understanding of simian taxonomy (orangutans are great apes, you imbecile!), but a valuable resource nonetheless. Jimmy Wales, I suggest you re-evaluate your criteria for "unmanageable listcruft" - you're letting hundreds of gems slip through your fingers!

From Deletionpedia, which is full of this kind of hilarity.

Pig holds woman hostage

2008-09-23T18:39:00.000-07:00

Large pushy pig traps Australian

A woman on the north coast of New South Wales in Australia is being held hostage in her own home by a large pig, Australian media report.
Uki woman Caroline Hayes, 63, says the pig is as big as "a Shetland pony" and that she cannot get out of her house because of its aggressive behaviour.

Ha ha, Australians. I wonder what it's like to live on a continent where all the animals are trying to kill you, all the time. At least they took care of this one:

Rangers say the pig will be captured and taken to a piggery.

In case you didn't know, a piggery is a horrible concentration camp for our porcine kin in which they spend their entire lives locked up in filthy, inadequate cells. Then they cut their throats and drain their blood, so you can eat pork chops in front of Project Runway and feel bad about your weight.

Mating Pigs vs. Japanese Newscaster

2008-09-22T14:27:00.000-07:00

Mating pigs interrupt Japanese newscaster

きゃ～！

The mongolian death worm

2008-09-17T07:30:00.000-07:00

In Search of the Mongolian Death Worm

Trudging gingerly across the arid sands of the Gobi desert, Czech explorer Ivan Mackerle is careful not to put a foot wrong, for he knows it may be his last. He scours the land and shifting valleys for tell-tale signs of disturbance in the sands below, always ready for the unexpected lurch of an alien being said to kill in one strike with a sharp spout of acidic venom to the face. A creature so secretive that no photographic evidence yet exists, but the locals know it’s there, always waiting in silence for its prey, waiting to strike – the Mongolian Death Worm.

I've become a lot more skeptical of cryptozoology lately, and given the fact that it doesn't seem like anyone has ever reported actually seeing a death worm there isn't much reason to believe this one. The article is even weirdly contradictory:

although they spoke to a number of Mongolians in the area, all of whom regaled wondrous stories of the worm, no one could verify they had seen the creature first-hand. Even still, after four weeks the team had gathered enough verbal evidence to be convinced that the worm really does exist. Lead researcher, Richard Freeman, said: “Every eyewitness account and story we have heard describes exactly the same thing

Right. Even so, I think there's merit in searching for these things if only because a discovery might lead to conservation. There are undoubtedly a lot of totally bizarre creatures we killed off without ever even finding them, and the Gobi is a very big, very desolate and very sparsely populated area. Also, it's in China, and if you've ever been there you know what that means (it means there is all sorts of weird stuff in China).

BEAGLE ESCAPE

2008-09-13T20:49:00.001-07:00

Inhumane animal traps

2008-09-09T21:15:00.000-07:00

Animal Trap Quiz Answers

This is probably the most interesting piece of internet I've seen since that list of goofy mugshots. A database of diabolical animal traps with detailed pictures? Actual photos, not just patent diagrams. It's like a birthday present from your aunt you haven't seen since you were six!

I could never pick a favorite (it'd be kind of like when someone asks you what your favorite band is, and you can't pick so you say something stupid like "Jamiroquai" even though you only know like eight of their songs), but I thought this "man trap" was particularly interesting:

"This invention relates to jaw traps and, among other objects, aims to provide a jaw trap which may be used to capture chicken thieves, being so constructed that the more the victim struggles the closer together the jaws move. A further object is to provide a jaw trap having a jaw locking mechanism which prevents the jaws from being pried apart by the victim, the mechanism itself being so guarded that the victim cannot release himself. A further object is to provide a jaw trap for the purpose stated which is so constructed that the victim is not injured in any way."

But the best thing on the page is this piece of insane ephemera:

Do you remember a time when people used to go out and shoot gophers? I sure goddamned don't. I don't even know anyone who would shoot a gopher. It's fun to laugh at the past.

What is it? is the main blog, and while I'm not sure why he makes a new blogspot account every time he posts answers, it's still pretty cool.

Warthog vs. Lion

2008-09-09T08:53:00.000-07:00

Despite what the Lion King may have taught you, Warthogs are nasty creatures (they're more like Bebop than Pumbaa).

Monkey loose, hide the toddlers

2008-08-21T11:32:00.000-07:00

Monkey eludes net-wielding police at Tokyo station

Around 30 police officers and other officials cleared the area and surrounded the animal with green netting, but at noon it jumped off the information board and escaped through the crowd.

Curiously absent (or rusu in Japanese) is where the monkey (saru) came from. A military expedition (enseigun, from ensei, expedition, and gun, for a troop or force), no doubt? Macaques are native to Japan(nihon), but usually stick to terrifying people in the woods (mori).

Chimpanzee penis vs. Frog

2008-08-18T14:41:00.000-07:00

Hi kids! I'm back from my vacation or whatever, thank you to Liz who put up some stuff while I was gone.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming: a chimpanzee raping a frog.

Monkey-faced pig

2008-07-29T14:41:00.000-07:00

I'm gone! This post comes to you from my substitute Battlezookeeper.

A wonderful creature has arisen in China: the monkey-faced pig. We can only hope that it grows up and has many babies that look just like it. I also anticipate it will gain the ability to shoot laserbeams from its eyes. What is clear is that it will terrify people for years. Or possibly be made into bacon, whatever,

Bear Cavalry...

2008-07-28T14:10:00.000-07:00

I'm gone! This post comes to you from my substitute Battlezookeeper.

According to this link, thirty bears besieged a group of geologists in Russia last week. They ate two geologists at their dig site. Hunters/rescuers were delayed by weather for days. Via 4chan, here is how I hope the siege ended.

The inevitable rise of monkey robot armies

2008-07-25T14:30:00.000-07:00

I'm gone! This post comes to you from my substitute Battlezookeeper.

So, let's start with the understanding that although the experiment shown in the video below may be for some good cause, such as helping people who have lost limbs, it could have world-changing consequences if the robot-armed monkeys escape. Incidentally, this blatantly non-trustworthy news site claims that the first thing the monkeys did when they acquired the robot-arms was fling poo. Naturally.

That video wasn't very scary, right? Vaguely worrying? Well, this one is both. Not only is it being developed by Boston Dyanamics for military use (great idea), it is utterly terrifying and makes a high-pitches whining noise while chasing you through the woods. And such.

I would say that the scientists involved in everything above have not seen or digested the lesson of scientific hubris of Jurassic Park. Now is it far-fetched to consider that the robot-arm wielding monkeys, though possibly cute, could acquire Big Dog robotic mounts and wage war upon us? I think not. Imagine this as their reconnaissance scouts:

Definitely not funny anymore. And they've clearly been practicing for years, waiting for us to perfect the technology necessary and randomly equip them with it. It will be a terrible battle and I totally warned you about it. My friend Claire from work helped me create an image of what the future could be:

Also, the robot-monkey-big-dog appears to be fighting multiple Fidel Castros. Awesome.

Catfish vs. Basketball

2008-07-22T07:09:00.000-07:00

Catfish eats basketball

A guy saw a ball bouncing around kind of strange like and when he went to investigate, it was a flathead catfish with a child's basketball stuck in its mouth and the pictures tell the rest of the story. His wife did have to cut the ball in order to deflate the ball and release the catfish.

Everybody eat a pigeon

2008-07-19T20:53:00.000-07:00

Pigeons: The Next Step in Local Eating (No, Really)

When you look at a pigeon, you might see a dirty, rat-like bird that fouls anything it touches with feathers or feces, but I see a waste-scavenging, protein-generating biomachine.
[...]
You see, city pigeons are the feral descendants of birds that were domesticated by humans thousands of years ago so that we could eat them and use their guano as fertilizer, we read in Der Spiegel. They're still doing their part, i.e. eating and breeding, but we humans have stopped doing ours, i.e. eating them.
Numbering in the hundreds of millions, they could be a new source of guilt-free protein for locavores in urban centers. Instead, we're still trying to kill off our species' former pet birds[.]

Delicious. It makes a hell of a lot more sense than raising chickens, and the locavore movement is possibly the only modern alternative food system that wouldn't completely destroy society as we know it (don't buy non-GM foods, kids). My mission for this Sunday is to go kill and eat a feral pigeon. I like this point near the end of the article, too:

Really, all pigeons need is a re-branding. Just as the spurned Patagonian toothfish became the majestic Chilean sea bass and the silly Chinese gooseberry became the beloved kiwifruit, pigeons can merely reclaim their previous sufficiently arugula-sounding name: squab.

Or the apparently inedible pitaya becoming the regal dragonfruit.

Bees vs. Japanese Crows

2008-07-18T00:17:00.000-07:00

Bees Enlisted to Attack Crows in Tokyo

After years of being attacked by crows, a colony of seabirds nesting in Tokyo is getting an unlikely ally: the tiny honeybee.

Conservationists hope bees will repel the crows, based on the insects' tendency to attack anything dark-colored that approaches their hives.

Oh man, letting 20,000 bees loose in downtown Tokyo? What in the world could possibly go wrong?

On the other hand, Japanese crows are spawn of Satan.

In a single prolonged attack five years ago, about 60 crows picked off roughly 300 eggs and 160 young birds, and fewer terns have come to the nesting site since then.

I've been told they actually attack people from time to time. Yikes.

Dogs dressed as humans

2008-07-16T20:48:00.000-07:00

Dogs and cats dressed as humans, circa 1914. Life sure was boring before the internet! memory.loc.gov is amazing, you can type in any old nonsense and it'll spit back a wealth of bizarrely antiquated prints.

This is now the fourth most popular post on Battlezoo, due to the multitudes of people who google "animal battle sex." Or maybe just the one guy who does it every day.

Eagle vs. Swan

2008-07-15T21:33:00.001-07:00

Eagle vs. Swan!

Ever give a pig a hj?

2008-07-13T08:32:00.000-07:00

"Pig AI - Landata-Cobiporc
Research and development firm for self swine artificial insemination "

Thank you Google, for placing only the most relevant ads on Battlezoo.

Protective Chicken Glasses

2008-07-13T08:17:00.000-07:00

It's widely known amongst agrarian types that chickens are the bullies of the barnyard. I'm not well versed enough in chicken-aggression to tell you exactly how often they end up fighting, but given that watching them is a sport unto itself I'd say often enough.

Anyway, what the hell am I talking about. This guy patented some chicken goggles.

Be it known that I, Andrew Jackson, Jr., a citizen of the United States, residing at Munich, in the county of Jackson, State of Tennessee, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Eye-Protectors for Chickens
[...]
This invention relates to eye protectors, and more particularly to eye-protectors designed for fowls, so that they may be protected from other fowls that might attempt to peck them

Improvements? Does that mean there were previous designs for chicken goggles that were deemed unsatisfactory? Sheesh, people had nothing to do before the internet.

Louis XI's pig organ

2008-07-12T07:50:00.000-07:00

That brutal monarch, Louis XI of France, is said to have constructed, with the assistance of the Abbé de Baigne, an instrument designated a 'pig organ,' for the production of natural sounds. The master of the royal music, having made a very large and varied assortment of swine, embracing specimens of all breeds and ages, these were carefully voiced, and placed in order, according to their several tones and semitones, and so arranged that a key-board communicated with them, severally and individually, by means of rods ending in sharp spikes. In this way a player, by touching any note, could instantly sound a corresponding note in nature, and was enabled to produce at will either natural melody or harmony! The result is said to have been striking, but not very grateful to human ears.

- J. Crofts, "Colour-Music," The Gentleman's Magazine, September 1885

The abbot of Baigne, a man of great wit, and who had the art of inventing new musical instruments, being in the service of Louis XI. king of France, was ordered by that prince to get him a concert of swine's voices, thinking it impossible. The abbot was not surprised but asked money for the performance, which was immediately delivered him; and he wrought a thing as singular as ever was seen. For out of a great number of hogs, of several ages. which he got together, and placed under a tent or pavilion covered with velvet, before which he had a table of wood painted, with a certain number of keys, he made an organical instrument; and as he played upon the said keys, he, by means of little spikes, which pricked the hogs, made them cry in such order and consonance, as highly delighted the king and all his company

- I. Platt, "The Swine's Concert," A Library Of Wonders And Curiosities Found In Nature And Art, Science And Literature, 1884

My kind of guy. Shamelessly stolen from Futility Closet, my new favorite blog.

Man vs. Elephant Butt

2008-07-08T21:45:00.000-07:00

I think this has been around for a while, but hoo boy is it funny.

American troops blow up a god damned dog in Iraq

2008-07-05T06:07:00.000-07:00

Here is a video of some American troops killing a dog, presumably in Iraq, with a lot more explosives than a dog normally warrants. I will reserve commentary, Battlezoo is not political!

You want a chili dog, NERD?

2008-07-03T20:58:00.000-07:00

"Battlezoo is a blog about animals fighting."

I think this qualifies: "Drunk redneck gets his ass kicked at HyperFest"

There's so much I could say about this, but I think the video speaks for itself. We'll be back to our regularly scheduled programming tomorrow.

Battle Sex Animal is my band's new name

2008-07-01T06:28:00.000-07:00

Hello dear readers!

Do you remember the day you found Battlezoo? It changed your life, didn't it? Chances are you were googling for animal facts, but my page stats tell me that's not exactly what everyone who ends up here is looking for. Here's a list of some of my favorite search strings that lead people to this fair blog:

fighting and fucking
animals hit by lightning
a cheetah climbs on a car and takes a dump through the roof (this was a lot funnier before I realized I'd posted a video of exactly that)
battle sex animal
elephant fucking humans
how to have sex with chikens
asian animals focking

And my favorite:

cat poop too soft

If only my problems were that interesting.

Rest in Peace, Ayveq the Masturbating Walrus

2008-06-30T04:00:00.000-07:00

I've never been to the New York Aquarium, but until recently one of their main attractions was a 2700 pound walrus named Ayveq ("walrus" in Yupik). Unfortunately, he died a week ago, succumbing to a massive, untreatable bacterial infection. Says the NY Aquarium's obit:

Ayveq will be remembered for his raffish ways and unusual skills such as whistling on cue, drinking down whole fish through a straw, and charming many generations of Aquarium visitors at the Sea Cliffs windows.

How sad! Who wouldn't miss a raffish walrus who can whistle on cue and suck fish through a straw?

Actually, it turns out that he's going to be remembered mostly for whacking off.

Ayveq, the walrus whose bizarre, though oddly compelling, masturbation rituals made him an international sensation at the New York Aquarium, has died. He was 14.

QUICKLY, TO YOUTUBE!

You know, I think I would call that oddly compelling. So compelling, in fact, that I had to look up walrus masturbation. Most of it was porn (no, really), but this video is shot from a much better angle and the walrus actually moans throughout it. Disclaimer: I'm not sure if this is Ayveq and the narrator is incredibly irritating, but it's worth watching. Err, it's something, anyway.

This week in animal attacks

2008-06-29T00:12:00.001-07:00

Cryptomundo has a good (is that the word for it?) round up of people attacked by animals in the past week or so.

A cougar attacked, killed and partially ate a New Mexico man living in a trailer, authorities announced on Tuesday, June 24, 2008.
[...]
Meanwhile, on Sunday, June 22, 2008, an adolescent male lose [sic] an arm during an alligator attack in Florida. The teenager was attacked by an 111/2-foot alligator, but managed to get away with his life but lost his arm.
[...]
Finally, in Kenya, Toroitich Kurere, 70, died at the Rift Valley Provincial General Hospital on Saturday, June 21, 2008 [...] The elderly man had fought off a hyena as it was attacking his son.

How unfortunate. Be careful, dudes.

Cat vs. Sanity

2008-06-27T08:56:00.000-07:00

This cat:
a) will haunt my dreams
b) was probably never adopted and subsequently put to sleep.

My favorite part is when the woman says "aww, Burgerrrr" and it lunges at her.

Komodo dragons vs. everything

2008-06-26T09:09:00.000-07:00

I don't know if you knew this, but Komodo dragons are terrifying. Having evolved on an island where there are no competing native carnivores, they're able to grow up to ten feet long and pretty much not worry about anything, ever (except logging!). They're not terribly forgiving with their food, either: "When suitable prey arrives near a dragon's ambush site, it will suddenly charge at the animal and go for the underside or the throat." In addition to being mildly venomous, their mouths harbor at least fifty-seven different kinds of bacteria to infect the shit out of the neck wound it just gave you. Here are some videos of Komodo dragons eating a whole pig and a live deer.

Goat vs. Electric Fence

2008-06-25T08:51:00.000-07:00

Liz: i.....think he likes it

Giant squid sex

2008-06-25T02:19:00.000-07:00

Weird sex: Giant squid do it deeper

VIGO, Spain (25 Sep 2005) -- RESEARCH by marine scientists has shed startling new light on the secret sex life of the giant squid, one of the most mysterious monsters of the world's deepest oceans.

I'm not sure if anyone thought that the sex lives of giant squid were something approaching "normal", but this is pretty bizarre.

"But males get round their inferior size by being endowed with a particularly long penis, which means they can inject the female without having to get too close to her chomping beak. The male's sexual organ is actually a bit like a high-pressure fire hose and is normally nearly as long as his body - excluding legs and head.

"But having such a big penis does have one drawback: it seems that co-ordinating eight legs, two feeding tentacles and a huge penis, whilst fending off an irate female, is a bit too much to ask, and one of the two males stranded on the Spanish coast had accidentally injected himself with sperm packages in the legs and body.

Yikes, I wonder if that's the cephalopod equivilent of your parents finding you sitting in your chair, pants down, strangled to death with a belt. Here's some more if you're so interested, including some slightly off-putting details of squid egg-laying.

Eggs soon funnel from her large, terminally positioned ovary into long, convoluted proximal oviducts ... The nidamental glands would then secrete vast amounts of jelly, probably almost entirely filling her mantle cavity. This jelly binds with discharging eggs, and like a cement mixer, her mantle probably rhythmically contracts and relaxes, thoroughly mixing them. Shortly afterwards this mass of jelly and egg would be extruded through her funnel, and a sphere-like egg mass of ~half-a-metre in diameter would be released. This mass would then be taken into her arms where she would cradle it as it absorbed seawater and increases in size (possibly to two-or-so metres diameter).

Ewww. I also found this picture of Japanese girls with octopi on their heads, if that's your kind of thing. Up to you.

Chase, the cat with no face

2008-06-24T00:01:00.000-07:00

"My name is Chase. I am 2 years and 3 months old. When I was 3-6 weeks old, in June 2005, I was hit by a car and left in the road."

Daily Tails [sic] of Chase

"I am NOT IN ANY PAIN! I am a very loving and friendly cat. I love to meet new dogs and cats and really like to lick them." Chase and I have something in common! I guess, way to go cat? Not only does he somehow manage to sleep with no eyelids, he's mastered the English language, learned how to type and figured out blogging software.

Alright, it's kind of hard to be cynical about a cat with no face. However, I am surprised to discover that there are actually a whole lot of blogs about cats with faces written in the first person.

I'm probably not qualified to call out stupid blog ideas, though.

Ants vs. Dead Gecko

2008-06-14T08:42:00.001-07:00

Canada goose attacks!

2008-06-04T21:45:00.001-07:00

This is worth watching if just for the "Ow, my dog!"

UPDATE: I have been informed that he might be saying "Get off my dog!" Upon further viewing, I have to agree.

Giant fucking hornets

2008-05-14T09:22:00.001-07:00

Hi kids! Today I'd like to talk to you about Vespa mandarinia, also known as the asian giant hornet.

Quoth wikipedia, "Vespa mandarinia, known colloquially as the Yak Killer Hornet, is the world's largest hornet, native to temperate and tropical Eastern Asia. Its body length is approximately 50.8 mm (2.0 in), with a wingspan of about 76 mm (3 in). Queens may reach a length of 55 mm (2.2 in). Due to its size, it is known in Japan as Suzume-Bachi or Sparrow-Bee.

It can be found in Primorsky Krai, Korea, China, Taiwan (where it is called the "tiger bee"), Indochina, Nepal, India and Sri Lanka, but is most common in mountainous areas of Japan"

That last part is fantastic, because that's where I am. I spend a lot of time in the woods, and I've had the good fortune (?) to run into a couple of these fuckers - they sound like helicopters. Oh, what's that, Wikipedia?

"The stinger of the Asian giant hornet is about 6 mm (¼ in) in length and injects an especially potent venom [...] Masato Ono, an entomologist at Tamagawa University near Tokyo, described the sensation as feeling 'like a hot nail being driven into my leg.'"

Wow, that sucks. But at least it's temporary, right?

"An allergic human stung by the giant hornet may die from an allergic reaction to the venom; but the venom contains a neurotoxin called mandaratoxin which can be lethal to people who are not allergic if the dose is sufficient. About 70 people die each year in Japan after being stung by giant hornets."

fuuuuuuuck. Here are some more awesome facts.

* The venom contains at least eight distinct chemicals, some of which damage tissue, some of which cause pain, and at least one which has an odor that attracts more hornets to the victim.
* The venom contains 5% acetylcholine, a greater concentration than is present in bee or other wasp venoms. Acetylcholine stimulates the pain nerve fibres, intensifying the pain of the sting.
* The enzyme in the venom is so strong that it can dissolve human tissue. On some occasions, the sting may be compared to the effects of a spider bite.
* Like all hornets, V. mandarinia has a barbless stinger, allowing it to sting repeatedly.

Luckily, given that the things are deadly and about the size of your thumb, they're not particularly afraid of anything. You'd probably have to be pretty stupid to be stung by one.

One small step for man, one less stupid bird

2008-03-28T14:21:00.000-07:00

Death metal puppy

2008-03-12T14:28:00.000-07:00

Beijing's kitty death camps

2008-03-10T10:11:00.001-07:00

Remember the ZOOS OF DEATH? Well, those wacky Chinese are still up to no good!

Olympics clean-up Chinese style: Inside Beijing's shocking death camp for cats

Thousands of pet cats in Beijing are being abandoned by their owners and sent to die in secretive government pounds as China mounts an aggressive drive to clean up the capital in preparation for the Olympic Games.

Hundreds of cats a day are being rounded and crammed into cages so small they cannot even turn around.

Then they are trucked to what animal welfare groups describe as death camps on the edges of the city.

Once again, the comments are the funniest part!

The Chinese people should be ashamed of themselves for killing cats and skinning dogs alive!

- Lyn Parker, USA

Yes, every single Chinese person should be ashamed.

Activists attack Japanese whalers with rotten butter

2008-03-05T16:13:00.000-08:00

Poor Nisshin Maru. As the largest ship in the Japanese whaling fleet, it gets a lot of flak from people like Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd. It's been rammed by Greenpeace boats twice (or rammed them, depending on who you talk to), denounced as a vessel for "cetacean serial killers," and it even caught on fire last year. Dozens of people have made it their life's work to follow the boat to the ends of the earth, stopping them from harpooning whales and bringing to mind the phrase "I don't come down to where you work and slap the dick out of your mouth."

Environmental activists do not like the Nisshin Maru.

Ever concerned about upping their street cred (ocean cred?), Sea Shepherd has done some ridiculous shit lately. About a month and a half ago, two of them actually boarded a whaling vessel and refused to leave until the crew had to tie them up. Now they've decided that the best way to preserve marine biodiversity is throw rotting butter at the poor little Nisshin Maru.

Japan whalers in 'butter attack'

Yeah, that's the title. A few choice quotes:

The acid thrown at the whaling ship stings if it gets in people's eyes.

Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith, although a vocal opponent of Japan's whale hunt, strongly criticised the Sea Shepherd's butter attack.

Oh okay whoa, check out this map of the International Whaling Commission's member states. Now that I know we have such landlocked powerhouses as Laos and Mongolia on our side, I'm sure we can stop this barbaric practice once and for all.

How not to release a bear into the wild

2008-03-03T20:24:00.000-08:00

When releasing a bear from a trap...

(link has more photos)

Morays: scarier than you ever thought possible.

2008-02-23T12:23:00.000-08:00

What the heck is going on right when it swallows the piece of squid?

That, pretty much. It turns out that moray eels have a pharyngeal jaw, which essentially means they have another mouth in their goddamned throat. Scroll down on that page for fun diagrams, then click this.

One more: MSNBC article

Baby kiwis are ugly

2008-02-18T11:08:00.000-08:00

A newly-born North Island Brown Kiwi, the 1,000th reared as part of a rescue programme in Rotorua, New Zealand, poses for the cameras.

From BBC's Day in Pictures.

Cutest animals that could still destroy you

2008-02-14T12:24:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the lapse, kids. My house burned down. For real.

Cracked.com's The 6 Cutest Animals That Can Still Destroy You.

If animals could talk, they would spend most of their time calling us dicks and telling us to get off their land. The traits we think of as "cute" are often simply tricks animals have developed to get tourists to throw them food.

Here are six animals that you'll probably want to steer clear of, no matter how adorable they look on that wall calendars.

The whole thing is worth reading, but if you must look at only one part let it be the swan video.

BACK IN THE POND, MOTHERFUCKER

Chinese people throw goats at lions, are evil

2008-01-22T11:30:00.000-08:00

Animals torn to pieces by lions in front of baying crowds: the spectator sport China DOESN'T want you to see

The smiling children giggled as they patted the young goat on its head and tickled it behind the ears.
[...]
It could have been a happy scene from a family zoo anywhere in the world but for what happened next.
A man hoisted up the goat and nonchalantly threw it over a wall into a pit full of hungry lions. The poor goat tried to run for its life, but it didn't stand a chance. The lions quickly surrounded it and started tearing at its flesh.

China is fucked up, okay, we get it. Do we really need sensationalist demonization like this?

"It's almost a form of child abuse," says Carol McKenna of the OneVoice animal welfare group. "The cruelty of Chinese zoos is disgusting, but think of the impact on the children watching it. What kind of future is there for China if its children think this kind of cruelty is normal?

"In China, if you love animals you want to kill yourself every day out of despair."

Oh, how about this!

"Zoos like this make me want to boycott everything Chinese," says Emma Milne, star of the BBC's Vets In Practice.

"I'd like to rip out everything in my house that's made in China. I have big problems with their culture.

I have big problems with their culture. Rattle that sabre! Here's a hint, people: there's a little more to "culture" than the things you don't like. Doesn't anyone remember Ota Benga, the African guy they put in the Bronx Zoo's monkey house?

Okay, enough outrage at a stupid tabloid. Check out some of the idiotic comments! (the first is my favorite)

Disqusting and sick; Is this the 21st Century? Never EVER having a Chinese meal again; Awful;

This makes me weep. If I can possibly boycott Chinese products I will do so. What a disgusting "culture".

How horrific it is to think of the suffering of these poor defenseless animals. It makes me wish (making me no better than them unfortunately.....)we could watch some of the handlers or bosses suffer a far more painful and slower demise in place of the creatures that are used for "sport".

This is absolutely barbaric! What type of human being or people in a culture get their kicks off of seeing such brutality on INNOCENT animals? Obviously the answer is the people in China.

Horde of ruthless crustaceans destroying Japanese island

2008-01-14T07:49:00.000-08:00

Japan seems to attract bizarre circumstances.

Crustacean "Swarm" Destroying Small Hiroshima Island

Millions of tiny crustaceans are causing a small island in southern Japan to disappear at an alarming rate, according to a local expert.

The animals, tiny relatives of crabs and shrimp that are known in the region as nanatsuba-kotsubumushi, are boring into the uninhabited island of Hoboro.

Japanese bloggers have apparently known about this for a few months, an a few appear to have gone and checked it out.

Goat vs. Entire herd of cows

2008-01-08T08:28:00.000-08:00

The Battle Is On: Cows Vs Goat - The funniest videos clips are here

Chicken on a Slide

2008-01-01T14:14:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year everybody!

Humongous 5000 pound Manta Ray

2007-12-27T22:51:00.000-08:00

Merry... whatever. Okay? Okay!

Did you know that manta rays can get goddamned gigantic? Check these two newspaper scans out, nearest I can tell they're real - Wikipedia, ever the scholarly source, says that "The manta ray, or giant manta (Manta birostris), is the largest of the rays, with the largest known specimen having been about 7.6 m (25ft) across, with a weight of about 2,300 kg (5,000 lb)."

I love how they shot it. PSA: "Although [mantas] may approach humans, if touched, their mucus membrane is removed, causing lesions and infections on their skin."

Don't do that shit.

Modern Mechanix

Feral children

2007-12-22T19:25:00.000-08:00

'Werewolf boy' - who snarls and bites - on the run from police after escaping Moscow clinic

Russian police are hunting a "werewolf boy" - who snarls and bites - after he escaped from a Moscow clinic just a day after being rescued from the wild.

Doctors expressed shock saying he was found living with a pack of wolves in a remote forest in the Kaluga region of central Russia.

Wikipedia says, "A feral child (feral, - wild or undomesticated) is a human child who has lived isolated from human contact from a very young age, and has no (or little) experience of human care, loving or social behavior, and, crucially, of human language." I've always thought Kaspar Hauser was interesting, but there are dozens of cases of this sort of thing.

Also: Feralchildren.com, and the incredibly uplifting Wikipedia article on child abandonment!

Tiny, harmless bird terrorizes senate press room

2007-12-18T23:27:00.000-08:00

Birdie Senate chase

A bird gets loose in the Senate Press gallery, and a chase with nets and granola crumbs ensues. CNN's Jeanne Moos reports

(bird in the senate? Get it? I think I'm funny.)

"Journalist" Jeanne Moos might make this video nearly unwatchable, but the reactions of the press critters are priceless. My favorite part is when one of them gets pooped on, but it's okay because "he's a bald guy."

Bonus: footage of bison breaking into a tennis court.

Deer vs. Swing

2007-12-18T10:50:00.000-08:00

hee hee hee

How many five year olds could you take in a fight?

2007-12-17T23:39:00.000-08:00

How many five year olds could you take in a fight?

While only related to animals fighting in the strictest sense, I felt that this was important enough to the development of humanity to add here. As it turns out, I could take nineteen five year olds in a fight. I'd say I'm satisfied with that result, and indeed hope to be able to verify it some day.

Man spends ten years training inspirational turtle to do tricks

2007-12-16T10:46:00.000-08:00

Plus small, disturbed children. Comedy gold:
"I thought it was really cool that you can train a turtle to do that, and I thought that anything is possible."

Human interest stories at their best.

Bears in ill-fitting hats

2007-12-13T16:47:00.000-08:00

There seems to be a photo pool on flickr for bears in ill-fitting hats. It's called, perhaps surprisingly, the bears in ill-fitting hats photo pool.

Trout Escape!

2007-12-12T13:27:00.000-08:00

Photographer captures trout's great escape

The owners of a trout farm were left baffled when fish were going missing. But then a wildlife photographer caught their extraordinary escape route on camera.
He pictured the trout making giant leaps out of their pond straight into the metal feed pipe three feet above the water level.
They then fought against the current for 30 feet until they reached the end of the eight inch wide pipe, which emerges underwater in a tributary of the River Itchen near Alresford, Hants.
-Telegraph

Also at Environmental Graffiti.

Pet Spa, the surefire way to make your cat hate you

2007-12-09T16:26:00.001-08:00

EXTREME PETE THE EXTREMEST SHREDDING DOG

2007-12-07T08:49:00.000-08:00

A Tony Hawk Favorite
Why I love it:
There are plenty of novelty "extreme" dog videos, but Pete has SKILLS. You can actually see him leaning on the wakeboard and his kickturns are ridiculous. Truly gnardog.

Tony Hawk, I wish I had half the command of obscure English vernacular that you do. shredordie.com

World of Warcraft: State-of-the-Art Moosefight Training Simulator

2007-12-06T15:25:00.000-08:00

Boy attacked by moose "feigns death," thanks WoW

A Norwegian news site is reporting that a young boy and his sister were attacked by a moose (same thing happened to my sister once), and the boy reportedly "taunted' the moose away from his sister, and then feigned death, causing the moose to lose aggro and leave. "Just like you learn in level 30 in World of Warcraft," the boy is reportedly quoted as saying.

In Norwegian.

Cat Tormented in Zero Gravity

2007-12-03T11:28:00.001-08:00

Jesus, sorry. This'll be sparse for a week or so.

Elephant Attacks Tourists, Llamas Make Hilarious Noises

2007-11-25T19:43:00.000-08:00

I think that was a female elephant, but I'm going to mention musth anyway because the Wikipedia article has this hilarious gem: "scientific investigation of musth is greatly hindered by the fact that, once under the influence of musth, even the most otherwise placid of elephants may actively try to kill any and all humans."

Oh yeah, and llamas make the same noises during sex as an ex-roommate of mine.

Billions (with a b) of Jellyfish Destroy Irish Salmon Farm

2007-11-23T09:23:00.000-08:00

Jellyfish attack destroys salmon

A jellyfish invasion has wiped out Northern Ireland's only salmon farm, killing more than 100,000 fish.

A Northern Salmon spokesman said last week's attack could cost more than £1m.

Billions of small jellyfish, known as Mauve Stingers, flooded into the cages about a mile into the Irish Sea, off Glenarm Bay and Cushendun.

Like all things British, Pelagia Noctiluca are usually kind of boring. But damn, "the jellyfish covered an area of up to 10 square miles and a depth of 35 feet." Did they see it coming? Were there crowds of Irish people standing on the dock, horrified at the swarm of mauve stingers bearing down on them?

This is actually becoming a very large problem all over the world, likely spurred by a warming of the oceans and overfishing. We've eaten most of the fish, and since nature abhors a vacuum the jellies are quickly becoming our new oceanic overlords. Sea (lol) also:
Jellyfish Bloom on African Coast
Jellyfish Bloom Swamps British Coastline
Jellyfish Bloom in Japan

And yes, there's even an international symposium on jellyfish blooms.

Regardless of whether or not this will eventually doom us all (if rising sea levels don't first), jellyfish are amazing to look at. If you haven't seen this video of the lake full of jellyfish in Palau, it's worth checking out.

Claw of a Gigantic Sea Scorpion Found

2007-11-21T11:46:00.000-08:00

Man sized sea scorpion claw found.

The immense fossilised claw of a 2.5m-long (8ft) sea scorpion has been described by European researchers.

The 390-million-year-old specimen was found in a German quarry, the journal Biology Letters reports.

Eurypterids, otherwise known as sea scorpions, evolved about 500 million years ago and died out about 250 million later.

Turns out, ancient arthropods (think crabs, spiders, centipedes, insects) are fascinating. The largest today is the Japanese spider crab, which can have a leg span of up to four meters, but the body itself is only about 37cm. Compared to what was running around in the Devonian, that's peanuts.

Hundreds of millions of years ago, before the Mesozoic and the rise of the dinosaurs, the high levels of oxygen in the air allowed arthropods to grow to sizes that would scare the crap straight out of you. Since they don't have proper lungs like pretty much anything in the phylum chordata, the size that insects, crustaceans, arachnids etc can grow to is directly proportional to the amount of oxygen in the air. Which meant that you'd have to put up with Arthropleura, a three meter long millipede.

Here's a video of one being impaled! Also includes meter long dragonflies and a spider the size of your head.

How to Sex Day Old Chickens

2007-11-19T11:10:00.000-08:00

Did you know there is only one way to tell the sex of a day old chicken? You have to examine its cloaca for a degenerate penis.

Over and over he scoops up a chick with his left hand, expels its droppings with a squeeze of his thumb, opens its vent with his fingers, peers through the magnifying lenses attached to his spectacles and determines its sex. Then he deposits the tiny bird in one of two bins. Two thousand vent sexes and a good day's work later, his hands and his shirt front are still immaculate. And if you buy sexed chicks from Lyle's employer, the sort is guaranteed 95% accurate.

Of course, it makes perfect sense that the Japanese came up with it.

Oh look! It's everyone's second favorite Discovery Channel host, Mike Rowe!

I don't know which I find more unsettling - that he calls a chicken vagina a "hidey-hole" or that he squeezes meconium onto the camera.

Want something more scholarly? You're in luck!

Seven Minutes of a Snake Eating a Pig

2007-11-18T19:02:00.000-08:00

Dog Almost Gets Struck by Lightning

2007-11-14T11:54:00.001-08:00

Almost

Crazed Turks Turkeys Mount Invasion of Boston Area

2007-11-13T15:26:00.000-08:00

Wild Turkeys' Lurking Puts Boston Area on Edge

The turkeys started chasing kids and joggers down the street. Neighbors would laugh watching the lawyer or pediatrician who lived next door being chased by a gobbling mob of birds.

When it happens to you, it's much less amusing.

Turkeys take to cities, towns

BROOKLINE - On a recent afternoon, Kettly Jean-Felix parked her car on Beacon Street in Brookline, fed the parking meter, wheeled around to go to the optician and came face to face with a wild turkey.

The turkey eyed Jean-Felix. Jean-Felix eyed the turkey. It gobbled. She gasped. Then the turkey proceeded to follow the Dorchester woman over the Green Line train tracks, across the street, through traffic, and all the way down the block, pecking at her backside as she went.

Battletoad strikes!

2007-11-11T09:19:00.000-08:00

Slug Sex!

2007-11-09T08:48:00.000-08:00

The mating habits of Limax maximus [the great grey or leopard slug] are considered unusual among slugs — the hermaphrodite slugs court – usually for hours – by circling and licking each other. After this, the slugs will climb into a tree or other high area and then, entwined together, lower themselves on a thick string of mucus, evert their white translucent mating organs (penises) from their gonopores (openings on the right side of the head), entwine these organs, and exchange sperm. Both participants will later lay hundreds of eggs. The tiny slugs emerging from the eggs need at least two years to reach sexual maturity.[1]

Scientists Discover Oldest Living Thing in the World Ever, Immediately Kill It

2007-11-07T19:52:00.000-08:00

Whoa! I've been busy as hell lately! I know you haven't gotten quite as much ridiculous animal nonsense lately, and I apologize. Moving on, let's take a look at the oldest clam in the universe.

Ming the clam is 'oldest animal'

A clam dredged up off the coast of Iceland is thought to have been the longest-lived animal discovered.

Scientists said the mollusc, an ocean quahog clam, was aged between 405 and 410 years and could offer insights into the secrets of longevity.

The scientists, being soulless murderers, promptly killed the clam. Seriously.

Did you know the largest species of clam is Tridacna gigas? They can grow up to five hundred pounds! I bet they're delicious, too. Look at how big this clam is!

Incidentally, the clam in that picture is actually giving birth. To thousands upon thousands of other monstrous clams. Watch your back, people.

Scientific Discovery of the Century: Herring Communicate via Farts

2007-11-05T11:15:00.001-08:00

Tiger Shark Goes Ridiculous on Loggerhead Turtle

2007-11-04T11:13:00.001-08:00

"Live every week as if it were Shark Week."

2007-11-03T23:03:00.000-07:00

Remember the elephants that get drunk after eating marula fruits? Here's a squirrel that, according to the description, did the same thing with fermented pumpkins.

Supermouse Video

2007-11-02T23:13:00.000-07:00

Here's a video of the supermouse that was posted earlier.

Python Attacks Rabbit

2007-11-02T16:53:00.000-07:00

There isn't anything not funny about this video, but the best is when the rabbit starts screaming and you can hear the guy's mom yell "SHUT THAT DOOR!" Fast forward to about 1:05.

Extra-Murine Abilities + Centipede Eats Mouse

2007-11-01T18:40:00.000-07:00

The mouse that shook the world

It can run for hours at 20 metres per minute without getting tired.It lives longer, has more sex, and eats more without gaining weight. Could the science that created this supermouse be applied to humans?

Scientists have been astounded by the creation of a genetically modified "supermouse" with extraordinary physical abilities – comparable to the performance of the very best athletes – raising the prospect that the discovery may one day be used to transform people's capacities.

Well damn, now that they've created this monstrosity we don't really have any choice but to apply this to humans. Lest we see Hitchhiker's Guide become a reality. Though then again, they're comparing him to Lance Armstrong - maybe we should really fear cyclists.

Hopefully, this video of a Vietnamese Centipede tearing a mouse to shreds will make you feel better. No, I don't either.

I love that they named him "Father Christmas" (it's in the youtube description).