Animals in the News
● A section of road in southern Illinois is closed twice a year while rattlesnakes, copperheads and water moccasins, among others, slither across. In the spring and autumn, snakes have the right of way in the LaRue Pine Hills Ecological Area of Shawnee National Forest during their annual migration. “The snakes have to travel 500 feet [155 m] from their winter home in the craggy bluffs to one of several swamps which have been created by the backwaters of the Mississippi and Big Muddy Rivers,” explained U.S. Forest Service Ranger Jay Wittak. “Several years ago we decided it would be easier to restrict traffic in the area than it would be to merely caution motorists,” Wittak added.
● Some scientists have wondered if the two-legged ostrich is more efficient or less so as a runner than four-legged creatures of similar size. To find out, two Harvard University researchers measured oxygen consumption of an ostrich and two Shetland ponies. They learned that the ostrich could outrun the little horses in short spurts, but the ponies had more endurance. However, both types of creatures used the same amount of oxygen to cover the same distance at the same speed. The British scientific journal “Nature” noted: “Comparison of all the energy cost of locomotion data available for a wide variety of animals representing 66 species shows no consistent difference between cost for bipeds [animals with two feet] and quadrupeds [those with four feet] of any size.”
● A whale of a story comes from San Ignacio Lagoon in Mexico, where science writer Jane E. Brody observed a large group of California gray whales in their winter home. She tells of one “as long as a city bus and weighing about 35 tons, and her two-ton calf [that] were bearing down hard on our 16-foot [5-m] skiff.” Then, “just when a collision seemed inevitable, the mother whale submerged and eased herself under the idling boat, lifting it partly out of the water with her blows and pushing it about with her heavily barnacled back,” relates Brody. “The calf swam alongside and presented its dimpled head to be stroked by the two-legged mammals it dwarfed.” She continues: “For half an hour, mother and calf cavorted around the boat, soaking us with their sprays from their two blowholes, taking turns having their rubbery skin stroked and standing on their tails and rolling on their sides to get a good look at us.” It seems that it is almost always mothers with calves that are so friendly.