Last week, a piece of space junk crashed into a savannah in Namibia, Africa. Though NASA wrote it off as just another “Composite Overwrapped Pressure Vessel”, or COPV, which are pretty common in space and often survive reentry and land on Earth intact, local authorities knew they had something special. In a press conference, Namibian president, Hifikepunye Lucas Pohamba, addressed press questions, “Oh yes, we did open it. It was filled with dead ants. We’ve recruited some experts to examine them, and they haven’t been able to identify them.”
He went on, “Carbon dating suggests that the ants are over 20,000 years old, which obviously makes no sense in any conventional way.” The international community, so far, has shown little reaction. When pressed on the matter, EU Secretary for Extraterrestrial affairs gave the following statement: “We do not believe the object is any reason for alarm. Many ants were launched into space during the 1970s in COPVs and we reject any results suggesting the ants date back to the stone age. Who even cared about ants back then? It’s a bunch of bologna, if you ask me.”
We’ll be following this story closely. I’m personally interested to find out if the ants are 100% carbon based, or if they have traces of silicon or arsenic. Stay tuned and stay watchful.
As Bearscare.org’s fourth anniversary approaches, I feel it’s time to offer a little clarification on the nature of the Honeybear, a rogue species of which little is known; the very existence of the Honeybear was a significant motivation when I founded this site and also The National Journal of Ursalography, the only periodical dedicated to the scientific study of bears and sometimes other animals.
Many people ask me if there’s any (non-taxonomical) relationship between the Honeybear and the honey badger, especially since the airing of “The Crazy Nastyass Honey Badger” (see below) by a fellow zoographer known only as Randall. The answer is a resounding NO. The honey badger deserves myriads of respect in its own right, but its notoriety arises from different characteristics than the Honeybear. The honey badger, pictured below in Fig. 1, is known to enjoy eating anything which can feel pain. It also has a sweet tooth (and can you blame it?), so locals began referring to Mellivora capensis by its more commonly known name.
In contrast, “the fact is that the Honeybear’s name comes exclusively from the color of its fur,” says Doug Gilmore, a Delaware park ranger turned naturalist and consultant to the Delaware Department of Parks and Wildlife. He goes on, “yes, we have found evidence that they do consume honey in that they eat the entire hive. The disorderly buzzing attracts them and they don’t turn down the opportunity to get a significant amount of protein from the bees, insoluble fiber from the hive walls and simple carbohydrates from the honey. In consuming honey, though, unlike the honey badger, the Honeybear actually eats the hive whole. Picture a someone picking oranges from an orange tree. It’s like that, except there’s only one orange and it’s very big and full of angry bees and honey.
Fig. 1 A honey badger after catching the scent of honey
“Sadly, we’ve noticed that more often than not, when a Delaware beekeeper goes missing, his hives do too. And, when we investigate, we find the telltale signs of a Honeybear attack that the police usually miss. You can’t fault them, though, since Honeybears leave very little behind. Usually there’s just some faint claw marks on nearby trees and a tuft of honey-colored fur or two. Blood is rare, as the Honeybear needs all the iron it can get. We don’t know whether the Honeybear smells the human prey first or whether it’s the incessant buzzing, but we do know it’s not the honey itself which attracts the bear.”
Fig. 2 A Honeybear hunting at the eastern edge of Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge near Milton, DE
I’ve also been asked which animal is more vicious and who would win if a Honeybear (see Fig. 2) were to fight a honey badger. Unfortunately, due to recent “laws”, such a matchup is illegal in most parts of the US, including Delaware, the only state where Honeybears are found. Furthermore, a Honeybear has never been successfully captured, much less transferred across state lines for any reason, whether legitimate or not. That said, it’s my opinion that a honey badger would have a very difficult time besting a Honeybear. Although the honey badger is very resilient, I believe that the Honeybear’s kill move–grasping the victim in its powerful jaws and shaking it violently at over 70 hertz–would ultimately subdue it. There’s a chance the honey badger could scurry into another animal’s borrow, if one were to be nearby, and wait out the confrontation, though. We know that honeybears will pursue new prey after several minutes of being unable to reach an animal. However, even just considering height and weight ratios, I would be very surprised to hear of a decisive win by a honey badger in a matchup.
When I say “venomous spiders”, where do you think of? Africa? Ausralia? The backwoods of West Virginia? All these answers are correct; well not entirely correct. A little known fact: Miami, Florida (USA) is home to the most poisonous spider. This spider, an extremely rare spider, is called the taupe recluse. Don’t laugh! It’s actuall related to the brown recluse but a SINGLE bit contains over 70 times the venom of a similar bit of a brown recluse.
The taupe recluse gets its name from–take a wild guess–the color of its belly. Actually, this spider looks identical to the brown recluse except for its underside; the brown recluse has a pinkish belly whereas the taupe recluse has a taupe belly. The taupe recluse lives exclusively in Miama and feeds primarily on spilled beach food such as hot dogs, chips, soda, whatever. Often, taupe recluse bites take some time to kill a person but quickly retard respiration without the individual’s knowledge. Hence, many drown after taupe recluse bites and these deaths are usually attributed to drinking, drugs, sting rays, sharks, Dutch teenagers, etc. The taupe recluse should be feard and nobody should visit Miama without reading this article.
Watch your ass because I’m too busy watching mine,
Abstract: A bunch of scientists went to Asia to look for animals. They found some new ones in the Mekong River which runs through China, Burma, Vietnam and some other countries. The pictures are pretty gross.
I Introduction
It happened again: spiders bigger than dinner plates. A recent discovery yielded several new species of animals which are shown right here.
II Findings
Figure 1 Scary green snake
Figure 2 Striped rabbit
Figure 3 Creepy millipede
Figure 4 A SPIDER THE SIZE OF A DINNER PLATE
III Analysis
This animals are pretty creepy, but overall I’m glad they were discovered. The snake is pretty sweet and I bet it tries to eat the rabbit. I think the rabbit is kind of stupid and definitely not very cute. The millipede is gross.
IV Conclusions
I really just care about that enormous spider. It sends shivers down my back just thinking about it.
CNN just released this video of a blue lobster with a pink belly. Apparently this happens to one in two million lobsters. So, if you’re into that stuff, take a look. If not, whatever. I don’t care.
Today my mom discovered the most terrifying spider. My wife took the picture below of it. If anyone knows what this beast is, please let me know. We’re really worried.
If you’ve heard that swarms of ants have invaded Texas but everything is OK because we can exterminate them, get your ears checked because it isn’t true. The ants are here and they’re here to stay. NOBODY–not even President Bush himself–can stop them. We don’t know much about them other than that they’re small, bitey and unkillable. Nobody from the governor’s office is brave enough to go public yet, but they all know (in their hearts) that Texas belongs to the ants now. New Mexico better start making room.
If you must, you can read more here. I don’t particularly recommend it, though. And, as always, if you read something which conflicts this website, it’s absolutely incorrect–don’t believe it.
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.
Recently, Foxnews.com published an article on eating insects, which is good. I haven’t gotten a chance to fully research the topic, but here’s the article:
Recently, during a Vatan, a popular newscast on Turkmenistan’s state TV station, a cockroach (Figure 1) appeared on the news desk. This little fellow jammed around, unnoticed by the anchors, for enough time to make “lap” around the desk before disappearing. The newscast was first aired at 9 PM and rebroadcast at 11 PM. The roach was not noticed until the morning [1].
Figure 1
Turkmenistan’s president, Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov (Figure 2), has, for some time, been trying to bring his once-Soviet nation into the modern world [2]. One of his efforts was to order his minister of culture, Gulmurat Muradov, to fix their aging TV station. Muradov appointed a committee which monitored the station daily from 9 AM – 6 PM. Three hours after the committee members left for the day, the cockroach made his debut on live TV. In response, an irate Berdymukhamedov fired 30 of the stations employees [2].
Figure 2
I would give ANYTHING to see this footage. Seriously, if anybody knows where to find a clip of this, tell me.
