BEARSCARE

This is absolutely tragic. These sickos in Peru dress up their Guinea pigs, take them out for parade and slaughter them. And then they eat them right then and there. Hey! I have an idea! Let’s take a bunch of PEOPLE and parade them down Broadway and eat them. How about that?

Listen up, everybody, this is important. Polar bears made the list of “threatened” species today. This is a great step forward in recognizing polar bears by our country, but let’s not forget who does the threatening. Polar bears are some of my favorite bears and nobody can hurt them. Probably a better list than “threatened” would be “so sweet they can even rip your head off”. Animals which I would put on that list (polar bears, great white sharks, koala bears, alligators, condors) should be protected and offered extra food to show respect. Threatened my ass.

I’ve been hearing a lot lately about bees disappearing by the millions. I’ve been wracking brain for some hours now figuring out why and have gotten nowhere. Nobody knows what happened to those bees and I don’t either. Upon this realization, I sat down in my thinking chair with a cup of honey and set out to find a work-around for the problem. And I did–it took me about 10 seconds. Now that’s smart thinking.

Here’s my idea: adopt a bee. Well, not just one bee–two bees. Exactly two bees, one male and one female. See, I realized that the biggest problem in the bee community is that the dominant queen represses all of the other girl bees keeping all the men to herself. But what if she isn’t fertile? Or what if she dies or disappears? Those girl bees need to know that they’re just as a good as the queen and they can be moms too. There are tons of female bees just sitting around in hives with nothing to do. They aren’t allowed to reproduce with the male bees because the queen said so. We need to free the bees.

I consider myself to be a very reasonable man. I don’t expect everybody to adopt two bees. If there’s about 6.6 billion people people in the world [1] and only 1 out of 100 adopted a pair, we would immediately have about 66 million new couples ready to restore the bee population to its former glory. Now, suppose each female bee were to lay 2000 eggs in the first year (this seems like a lot, but it’s only about one day of egg laying [2]) and only half survived to adult beehood. Then, by the end of the first year, we would have turned 66 million bees into 66 billion. That’s 10 times the human population in just one year. Assuming a male to female ratio of unity, the next year’s bee population would increase to 66 trillion. That number is larger than the gross world product measured in USD [3].

So, there you have it. The bees will be fine but it will take commitment on our part. I suggest that community leaders designate about 0.1% of their subjects as foster bee-parents. The entire community, of course, would be expected to chip in but the primary parents should have the time and means for this monumental task. I plan to assemble a crack team of zoologists, statisticians, botanists (boring) and historians to draw up formal plans and submit them to leading non-profits for review. In particular, we are hoping to win the support of Häagen-Dazs and their Help the Honeybees foundation (http://www.helpthehoneybees.org). All proceeds from Moonscreen sales (http://www.moonscreen.info) will be put toward this noble cause. I suggest readers buy a tube of Moonscreen to protect their skin from harmful moon-rays and our bees from almost-certain extinction.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population

[2] http://www.main.org/cahbs/cycle.htm

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_world_product

It’s a rare day when a grizzly bear attack is national news. Today is one of those rare days. A bear, called Rocky, who appeared in Will Ferrel’s timeless classic, Semi-Pro, bit his trainer on the neck. As you might guess, a grizzly bite to the neck is tough thing to walk off and Stephan Miller probably died on the spot. This happened in Big Bear Lake, CA.

The authorities have not decided what to do with Rocky. While my condolences go out to the Miller family, I feel strongly that the bear should be set free. Or at least not killed. Rocky really didn’t know any better and no grizzly bear should be punished for being a grizzly bear. If you devote your life to training some of the most dangerous animals in the world, you must accept the risk that those animals could kill you. Irwin died doing what he loved and I can only hope that Mr. Miller really loved bears–because, well, I hope he loved them. Below is a picture of Rocky. That is all.

Recently, there has been a dearth of relevant animal news. This all changed when we were contacted by a leading arctozoologist who is very concerned about the survival of polar bears in the rapidly changing environment. The scientist asked that we only refer to him as “Dr. P” because he fears for his own and his team’s safety amidst uprisings spawned from the “vast, irreversible effect my ideas will have on the American populace”. So, Dr. P it is.

“Fewer bears are having fewer cubs. Many female bears choose not to take a mate but once every three to four years,” Dr. P wrote. He claims that the data he has collected over the last two years indicates that the polar bear population in the Arctic is dwindling exponentially and he expects there to be only a handful of mating pairs by the end of 2009. “Immediate action must be taken”.

In the correspondence we received, which will not be published because Dr. P’s full identity would be determined even by the most simple, he detailed a radical plan to re-home a core population of 10,000-12,000 bears in Ohio immediately with more individuals arriving by the thousand every two months. He says the idea hit him like a “400 pound seal” while reading reports of record snowfall in the USA.

“Sure, there isn’t a natural food source for large predators in Ohio. I know that. And I know that some house-hold pets and stranded motorists may go missing. But the naysayers are looking at this all in the wrong way. If there’s anything history has taught us, it’s that sacrifice is necessary and healthy. Plus, we would replace all pets. Often with better ones,” Dr. P wrote.

Although his plans are still coming together, this influential (among arctozoologic circles) scientist felt the idea should be broached to the public so that the “strongest academic minds might engage in civilized debate followed by a planning and implementation process”. Calculations we were shown indicate that polar bears could be restored to prehistoric levels within the decade. “It is my belief that whether we like it or not, we are at the cusp of a new age. The Bear Age.”

Just now I took a quick glance at all the major candidates’ websites and McCain’s was the only one that made any mention of anything even remotely close to bears or other wildlife (the Parks Service). This is deeply disturbing to me. I have tentatively decided to endorse John McCain for president but feel that his commitment to bear conservation is lacking. I hope that he will address my concerns over the next few months.

Obama and Clinton only care about global warming. Global warming is important as it affects polar bears, but it needs to be addressed in that context. I am very concerned that the bears will be overlooked in any democratic plan to reverse climate change. All they care about is rising water levels in Florida. Well boo-hoo. Who cares? Huckabee didn’t even mention environment/animal issues as far as I could tell. We need to save the seals and we need to save the polar bears. We need a president who is not afraid.

I will be submitting videos to youtube with questions for the debates. And if those questions aren’t answered, the people who pick questions will feel my scourge. Especially that clown Anderson Cooper.

Surfers in Cocoa Beach, FL are being denied access to whales. Why? Because they’re “endangered”. Well, what about the surfers? They want to meet the whales. Let them.

So, the San Diego Zoo has some new grizzly bear cubs (see below).

They look pretty sweet and I’m going to free them.