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a-dinosaur-a-day · 6 years ago

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Nyctibius

Common Potoo by Gmmv1980, CC BY-SA 4.0

Etymology: Night Feeder

First Described By: Vieillot, 1816

Classification: Dinosauromorpha, Dinosauriformes, Dracohors, Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Averostra, Tetanurae, Orionides, Avetheropoda, Coelurosauria, Tyrannoraptora, Maniraptoromorpha, Maniraptoriformes, Maniraptora, Pennaraptora, Paraves, Eumaniraptora, Averaptora, Avialae, Euavialae, Avebrevicauda, Pygostaylia, Ornithothoraces, Euornithes, Ornithuromorpha, Ornithurae, Neornithes, Neognathae, Neoaves, Strisores, Caprimulgiformes, Nyctibiidae

Referred Species: N. bracteatus (Rufous Potoo), N. grandis (Great Potoo), N. aethereus (Long-Tailed Potoo), N. leucopterus (White-Winged Potoo), N. maculosus (Andean Potoo), N. griseus (Common Potoo), N. jamaicensis (Northern Potoo)

Status: Extant, Least Concern

Time and Place: From 12,000 years ago through today, in the Holocene of the Quaternary

Potoos are known from Central and South America, around the Equator

Physical Description: Potoos are some of the weirdest birds alive today, looking about as ridiculous and muppet-like as any bird can really look. I’m honestly not sure if there is another living dinosaur that looks more like a muppet - and, of course, we don’t know if any extinct dinosaurs could have taken home the gold. The only probable and possible contender is the Frogmouth, which may just be the slightest amount more muppet-like, but it’s a close contest. They have distinctive faces, that are more feather than underlying tissue - their beaks stick out a bit, with a small hooked beak at the end. They have a large mouth, covered in fluff. Their eyes have a general sunken in appearance, which makes them look very large compared to the rest of the face. Their heads are very large compared to the rest of their bodies, and they have long bodies with short wings and long, fluffy tails. So, when they stand up, they look… well, they look like a stump, or a log standing up. They can then make themselves skinnier, which makes their eyes stand out compared to the rest of their bodies… which gives them the general appearance of a completely ridiculous animal. They can range in size from 21 to 58 centimeters, and range in color from reddish brown, to more orange brown, to more grey in color. This genus is not sexually dimorphic, though some species have variants in color.

By Charles J. Sharp, CC BY-SA 4.0

Diet: Potoos eat a lot of insects - from beetles to moths, to mantids, ants, termites, cicadas, leafhoppers, and grasshoppers.

Rufous Potoo by Eric Gropp, CC BY 2.0

Behavior: Potoos will hunt by standing extremely still on their perches - often, again, making themselves to look like a continuous log - and waiting for food to appear. Since they’re nocturnal, they are easily missed by the insects, as they blend into the background around them. Then, when they spot the prey, they launch forward, jutting forward to catch the insects and swallow them. Some species are more clumsy in this endeavor than others, though some are able to make leaps over several meters in order to grab the food they desire. They then return to the same post, returning to their previous log-like stillness as they wait for more food to appear. They’ll look around for the food by turning their heads rapidly from side to side - weirdly like owls, though they are not closely related to them at all. These perches can be only one meter off the ground, or up to 19 meters, depending on the forest around the potoo in question.

Common Potoo by the American Bird Conservancy

Potoos aren’t the most musical or birds, but they are loud - they make harsh, guttural “bwa-bwa-bwa” calls, similar to laughing or wailing. They can also make drawn out, descending rasps, that are… somewhat more musical at least. They tend to make their sounds mostly at dusk, right before dawn, and also on moonlit nights - so when it is Dark, but not too dark. These sounds, of course, do vary from species to species. There are some courtship calls, including descended calls made by females during the mating ritual, but they aren’t a major feature of these events. So, instead of picturing the great wolves as your moonlight singers, remember: the Potoos can and WILL be making these weird urts, laughs, and whistles, every time the moon is full and out in the sky. Potoos do not migrate, but they do appear to move sporadically in response to season changes and mating territory disturbances.

Long-Tailed Potoo by Lee R. Berger, CC BY-SA 3.0

As for nesting, Potoos are not… fantastic at the prospect, because of their tiny legs and weird, weird beaks. This makes them not great at both sitting on the nest and feeding the chicks. Still, they do it anyway, and clearly well enough since they aren’t endangered with extinction. They are monogamous, with both parents working together to incubate the egg and raise the chick, and they don’t build a nest - instead, the egg is laid in a depression on the branch, usually on top of a rotting stump. The male incubates the egg during the day, while the female will do so with the male at night. The chick is hidden almost entirely through camouflage. They hatch about a month later, and then stay in the nest for two more months, being protected by the parents and fed by them as well. They look… like clumps of fungus. Hiding underneath the log of their parents. The parents will defend themselves and the nest with mobbing behavior, crowding a predator and dive bombing it, and also calling at it loudly. In short, these birds are a Giant, Giant mess of Chaos.

White-Winged Potoo by Mark Sutton

Ecosystem: Potoos are known primarily from rainforests, and can be found at any level of the forest - some Potoos are known from the understorey, some from the middle, and some from the canopy - it really depends. They’re also found in very swampy forests, depending on the species and the habitats in question. They tend to stick to where there are easily accessible sources of water, regardless, especially rivers and lakes in the jungle. They stick to the deep interior of the forest, not venturing to forest edges much unless driven to by necessity. Some species are also found in mountain forest habitats. They have few natural predators after reaching adult size, though the young are hunted upon by monkeys and falcons.

Andean Potoo by Isirvio, CC BY-SA 2.0

Other: Potoos are a part of the Stirsorians, a group of WEIRD BIRDS that are adapted for a variety of extremely unique ecological niches, usually depending on their flight style. Close relatives of the Potoo include the Frogmouth, Nightjars, Oilbirds, Swifts, and Hummingbirds, among others. Potoos are highly adapted for their nocturnal lifestyle, adapted to blend in with their forested surroundings above all else. None are threatened with extinction at this time, though of course some species are rarer than others, and all are vulnerable to climate change and extensive habitat destruction in the American Rainforests. They are also quite uncommon birds, which of course affects their vulnerability as well.

Northern Potoo by Dominic Sherony, CC BY-SA 2.0

Species Differences: The different species of Potoo vary mainly on size, coloration, habitat, and location. The Rufous Potoo is one of the most notable, being very red in color and also the smallest species; it is known from northern Amazonia, in the middle and lower storeys of the forest. Great Potoos are the heaviest species, and greyish to yellowish brown; they are found in the canopy of Amazonia. The Long-Tailed Potoo is the longest species, and is a darker brown; it is found in lowland forest in Amazonia. The White-Winged Potoo has - you guessed it - white wings, and is small in size; it is found in the canopy of lowland Amazonia rainforest. The Andean Potoo is very dark and Extremely Muppety, and is found in mountain forests in the Andes Mountains. The Common Potoo is the most middle brown of them all and very middle in size, so the Averagest Potoo of them All; it is found in wet open woodland, usually at forest edges and the canopy, throughout Northern South America. The Northern Potoo is similar to the Common Potoo but usually larger, and it is also found in forest edges, but in Central America and the Carribean.

~ By Meig Dickson

Sources Under the Cut

Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2017. The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world: v2017.

Cohn-Haft, M. (2019). Andean Potoo (Nyctibius maculosus). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Cohn-Haft, M. (2019). Common Potoo (Nyctibius griseus). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Cohn-Haft, M. & Kirwan, G.M. (2019). Great Potoo (Nyctibius grandis). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Cohn-Haft, M. & Kirwan, G.M. (2019). Long-tailed Potoo (Nyctibius aethereus). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Cohn-Haft, M. & Kirwan, G.M. (2019). Northern Potoo (Nyctibius jamaicensis). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Cohn-Haft, M. & Kirwan, G.M. (2019). Rufous Potoo (Nyctibius bracteatus). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Cohn-Haft, M. (2019). White-winged Potoo (Nyctibius leucopterus). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

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weirdanecdotes · 5 years ago

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Too Many Roosters

From a very early age, I always wanted a small cottage with a big garden and a small flock of hens. I had no special love for chickens as a species; they weren’t up there with kittens, puppies, pandas and koala bears on my list of cute animals. I wanted them for fresh eggs and aged manure to re-activate my garden beds. My desire was strictly practical.

A flock of four to eight layers could easily provide what an old couple needed but Dear Husband (DH) had higher ambitions including breeding his own. Consequently, we ordered two Partridge Rock roosters, two Easter Egg-types along with twenty-one hens in those two breeds and Silver-Laced Wyandottes because they looked pretty in the hatchery’s online catalog. We expected a bonus “exotic” chick for a total of twenty-six. What we got was twenty-nine balls of fluff. Not being the types that would complain about getting more than we paid for, we considered ourselves lucky. We ordered an excess of chickens in the first place because DH expected 50% losses along the way. He was wrong.

I discovered baby chicks are quite adorable little balls of furry fluff that sit in the palm of your hand. They cheep and emit tiny whistling noises and blink at you anxiously. Among themselves they huddled together for warmth and comfort, making an effort to recover from the trauma of their short lives. They had gone from an egg to a box, gotten jostled thru the US Postal Service, roared down a highway, and been spilled into a Rubbermaid bin with an infrared lamp instead of a hen to keep them warm. At intervals during the day, a giantess came and, at random, plucked them up, checked their butts for pasting and terrified the heck out of them.

With twenty-nine of them, it was impossible for me to develop any kind of one-on-one relationship with any of them and they all seemed very much alike in their reactions. A couple of them weren’t as terrified of me but generally I didn’t feel an empathetic connection to the little critters. They were a means to an end and not intended to be pets. Eventually, I expected to eat them so becoming emotionally attached seemed counter-productive.

By the time they were two months old and let outside, the roosters were clearly identifiable by being larger and more aggressive. We ended up with two Golden Red Araucanas, one white Easter Egger and four Partridge Rocks for a total of seven obvious roosters. We went back and forth on the sex of the “exotic” who early on got named Odd Chick on account of being so different from all the rest. Odd was much bigger than the obvious roosters but had a round female body and a very passive disposition. We thought it might be a Silver Laced Cochin because of its feathery feet and black and white markings but we never sure.

I got into the habit of going out every evening after dinner and sat on a garden stool in the middle of their grazing yard to observe their behavior. It was relaxing to do so and amusing. My first feelings were that they were vaguely reptilian. They reminded me of characters in the Jim Henson movie Dark Crystal. I couldn’t see how anyone could develop affection for these last remaining links to the dinosaurs with their b-b-sized brains and robotic responses. I didn’t see any thoughts or feelings behind their eyes, only genetically-programmed instincts.

I started giving them names just to be able to talk about them to DH. The two red roosters got named Big Red and Lil�� Red.

The white one became Whitey. The biggest Rock was Mister Big.

The three lesser Rock roosters and all of the hens went unnamed for weeks because of a lack of distinguishing behavior. It wasn’t necessary to refer to them because they didn’t do anything remarkable.

The roosters, on the other hand, engaged in daily battles for dominance. A pair of them would lock eyes across the yard and rush at each other at top speed until they crashed chest-to-chest and knocked each other backwards. Standing a foot or so apart, they would then spread their legs in a wrestler’s stance, crane their heads forward on elongated, fluffed-out necks and have themselves a stare-down. The first one to blink lost the game and would run away, cowering. Some evenings, the yard looked like a Mosh Pit with the males careening at each other and knocking each other silly. Since Odd didn’t play these games and hung with the hens, I became convinced it was a she.

As time passed, Big Red and Mister Big got so much larger than the others that the game ended at the beginning with the smaller rooster getting bumped so hard he scrambled to get away. Oddly, the big guys didn’t confront each other. The lessor Rock roosters stopped wanting to play at all, cowered at a glance from another male, and hid among the hens.

Only Whitey and Lil’ Red continued to challenge the hierarchy and the game evolved to the next level. Instead of letting the loser of the bump-and-stare retreat, the larger rooster would then pursue him and snatch his tail feathers. This would bring me off my stool, yelling. I couldn’t sit there and watch physical harm being done. Even so, the saddle of Whitey’s back ended up bald before he gave up and took to slouching down behind the hens to make himself invisible.

Now, I suppose Whitey brought this upon himself by constantly picking fights with the bigger roosters and, as DH explained, it was the law of the barnyard in action but I felt sorry for him. DH, who grew up on a farm, told me that one day one of the roosters might kill another one and that’s the way it worked. The biggest, baddest rooster got to rule the flock and pass his genes unto the next generation.

From my point of view, Lil’ Red’s behavior became pathological. He sought out confrontations with the bigger roosters like he had delusions of grandeur. Being sneaky and quicker was his advantage. He always got away before his tail feathers could be snatched and acted like that was a victory. He would strut about, nodding his head on an elongated neck like he was the boss of the block and to prove it he’d attack a hen or two. Viciously, he darted up behind an unsuspecting hen and stabbed her in the back with his beak or raked her head with his talons.

I decided I really didn’t like Lil’ Red very much. He wasn’t as pretty as Big Red and didn’t have the thick neck and whiskers that distinguish the breed. In fact, his head looked too small for his body. His eyes were rimmed with red flesh and he started to look demon-possessed to me. He’d get up in my face while I was sitting on my stool, take the stance and lay a stare on me. I thought he was surely crazy if he thought he could fight me and win no matter how fast he was.

One evening, Big Red was grazing in the grass and Lil’ Red snuck up behind him, bit into his neck, and did not let go. Big Red twitched and ran with Lil’ Red hanging from his neck. He slung his burden left and right, against fence posts and walls, and still Lil’ Red held on. Exhausted and screaming with pain, Big Red crouched down and shivered. Suddenly every rooster in the yard was on top of him, stabbing and stomping to finish him off.

I was already on my feet, yelling, running across the yard, and when the pile-on occurred I was there to slap and kick away the attackers. The roosters scattered from my wrath and Big Red lay still on the ground. As I stooped to pick him up, Lil’ Red came at me and I backhanded him across the yard. I scooped up Big Red and took him in the house.

We put him in our “hospital” bin, gave him massive doses of vitamins, and kept him in for a couple of nights. I was all for killing Lil’ Red right then. As I saw it, he had violated some kind of chicken code of honor by sneaking up on Big Red from behind. He didn’t deserve to be king of the flock for being devious. DH thought Lil’ Red showed intelligence and didn’t think we should do more than give Big Red another chance to fight for his status.

By the third morning, Big Red was frisky and pressing to get out of the bin so I carried him back to the yard, let the other chickens out of the coop, and watched to see what would happen. He puffed himself up to his full height and stood his ground as some of the hens came around him and made cooing noises. Mister Big nodded but didn’t challenge him. Lil’ Red came out, saw Big Red, and darted around the yard hiding behind hens and smaller roosters. I stood watch for a couple of hours as Big Red went about his business, feeding and drinking, and Lil’ Red kept as much distance as possible in a fenced yard. When it appeared that Big Red had no concept of revenge but had learned constant vigilance and Lil’ Red shied from a re-match, I left them for the day.

That evening Little Red went on a rampage of hen attacks and Whitey was doing it, too. It appeared to me that knowing they couldn’t win against the alpha males, these two malcontents were determined to boss over anyone they could. DH explained that biting hens on the neck is the rooster equivalent of foreplay but I found it very disturbing.

As the days passed, all four of the dominant roosters began biting the hens. They showed no signs of knowing what to do next but they seemed to be having a competition to see who could bite the most necks. The two biggest, dominant roosters – Big Red and Mister Big -- were paradoxically the most gentle; they’d nip, get a squawk and let go. Little Red and Whitey were downright vicious. They’d grab onto a hen’s neck and wouldn’t let go. The poor hen would flap her wings, shriek in pain and wrench her body away at the cost of a few feathers. Lil’ Red made a big mistake trying to bite Odd’s neck. S/he whipped around, Ninja-fashion, jumped up and stomped on his back.

The three lesser Rock roosters just watched; they appeared to have given up their maleness weeks before. The reward for their lack of competitiveness was getting bitten in the neck by Lil’ Red or Whitey. Lil’ Red went beyond that, of course. He’d bite the smaller Rock in the neck then use his foot to bring their head down on the ground and stomp their beaks in the dirt.

So one morning, I wasn’t surprised when the smallest Rock rooster had his left eye swollen shut. I took him into the house and put him in the hospital bin. When DH got home, we gave him antibiotics and vitamins. I wondered out-loud why we were investing effort in the weakest link in the flock. But, instead of putting the pathetic creature out of his misery, DH jokingly named him One-eyed Jack. After a couple of days, it became clear the eye was damaged beyond repair but still DH couldn’t find the will to kill the poor creature. Jack was such a timid, pathetic critter that after a couple more days neither could I.

I admired many of the other chickens for their beauty but this was the first one for whom I felt any affection. He didn’t instinctively jerk away from me; that was the difference. He seemed to like my attentions. I tried to return him to the flock but it didn’t work. Within minutes, the hens were pecking at him and I had to scoop him up. Perhaps, he smelled too human or they all just immediately knew he would never be of any use to them. I let him roam outside of the yard and watched as he ran around the perimeter of the fence trying to find a way back into the flock. It wasn’t going to happen; Big Red and Mister Big prowled the fence beside him, trying to peck him thru the wire. After a while, he took shelter in the compost shed beside the grazing yard and just watched the other chickens from a distance. I brought him feed and water and let him be.

That night when I went out to close up the coop, there was Jack roosting on the handle of my watering can by the backdoor. I brought him back in and put him in the bin. DH laughed, “We’ve got a house chicken now!”

Meanwhile, my evening visits to the chicken yard had become quite upsetting. The place was a frenzy of pain and misery as Lil’ Red and Whitey attacked everything smaller than they were. So I presented the problem of too many roosters to DH. Having the rooster population inside the chicken yard reduced by one seemed to accelerate the competition. Could we just get rid of the main offenders?

Perhaps he thought I was exaggerating and came out to see for himself. After witnessing repeated attacks on the hens in less than ten minutes, he became irate, chased down, grabbed and tossed the excess roosters out of the yard. Lil’ Red, Whitey, and even the two smaller Rocks found themselves on the outside with Jack. Like a pathetic puppy, Jack greeted them happily only to be rebuffed with pecks and nips. Having a better knowledge of the lay of the land, he avoided them after that. I protested the ejection of the two smaller Rocks; they were blameless. But, DH was too angry to hear reason. He swore that he regretted ever getting roosters at all and even Big Red and Mister Big were on probation. If he saw them mistreating the hens, they’d be out, too.

By nightfall, Whitey and Lil’ Red had figured out how to get back into the yard by climbing atop the compost heap and then flapping over the fence. They celebrated their return by attacking any hens that got within two feet of them. DH didn’t feel up to chasing them down again and decided to see if the yard would settle down. So for a couple of nights, Jack came inside and the two hapless Rocks who continued to shun him were left to find shelter under the compost shed. And Lil’ Red and Whitey continued their reign of terror.

On the third morning when I went to let the chickens out of their coop, I discovered three explosions of feathers across the lawn and one Rock cowering alone behind the feed can in the compost shed. DH said it was a dog that did the deed. I worried the dog would return for the remaining outside Rock. Or worse, come again to dig under the fence and find some way into the coop. Leaving it to Nature to cull the flock might have brought unintended consequences…

That evening as I sat on the patio at dusk, Jack loped up to me and clucked with anxiety. I assured him that I would take him inside again. Not contented by the sound of my voice, he hopped up into my lap, scurried up my chest and took roost on my shoulder. I slowly stood up and went over to the kitchen window to call DH to look out. “Aaarg,” I said, “I’m a barnyard pirate with me one-eyed roo.”

The following morning, DH arose at 5am and sat with his shotgun across his lap to wait for the return of whatever had killed the deceased and never-named rooster. Whatever it was did not return that day.

All day the remaining free-ranging rooster kept company with Jack deciding, in the absence of others, that he wasn’t such a bad fellow after all. I named him Curly for his corkscrew tail feathers. It seemed like it would be a good arrangement but the problems with Lil’ Red and Whitey remained unresolved.

The next day DH decided to chase them down and clip their wing feathers so they couldn’t get back into the yard. It took sweaty effort to chase them down and even with half of their left wings cut off the demon roosters flapped back over the fence. Lil’ Red immediately grabbed Odd by the neck and started to claw his/her head. That was it for DH; Odd was the prettiest chicken we had. He ran into the yard, grabbed Lil’ Red off Odd, and broke his neck with a quick jerk. Still in a fury, he started to chase Whitey then said, “Hell, I’m not wasting my breath,” went into the house and came back out with his rifle. That solved that.

By evening, tranquility settled upon the chicken yard. Big Red and Mister Big strutted with unchallenged superiority and felt no need to bite necks. Both of them crowed to let everyone in the neighborhood know they were the Bosses in our yard. Then, Odd made this noise, not a crow at all, more like the cry of a wild loon and still we wondered if he was a stealth rooster or whether she was announcing she was Queen of the Hens. Curly was cozy with Jack in the compost shed. Instead of digging a hole, DH strode off to the woods and made an offering of the dead demon roosters to the buzzards. That night I was all for putting Curly inside with Jack but he wouldn’t let me catch him. He made it thru that night and all seemed, as it should be.

The next day after dinner, we went out to the garden and discovered another explosion of feathers by the compost shed. In broad daylight, something had come and taken Curly. Jack had wedged himself between the fence and the feed can and only lost part of his tail feathers. When I called for him, he jumped out of his hiding place and flapped up into my arms. I took him inside immediately and the next morning he resisted when I tried to take him out of the bin. I decided to let him stay inside. I stayed outside all day in horrid heat, waiting and watching, then all of the next day until I had to go inside to fix dinner.

When DH got home, he hammered on the kitchen window yelling that there were dogs in the yard. I ran out and there was a golden retriever and a black mixed-breed strolling toward the chicken yard. The retriever got to the fence first and the chickens looked at him curiously. When the black dog came into view, they jumped up, made frantic cries of alarm, and ran into the coop. The black dog had a collar so DH told me to run and get the camera while he called the dogs to him. When I returned moments later, the black dog had already gone into the compost shed, returning to the scene of the second hit. The retriever showed no interest in the chicken yard; he was far more interested in having DH scratch his head. I took pictures of the black dog in the shed. It even went over to Jack’s hiding place and nosed around. It then went to the first explosion of feathers it had made and nosed around there. Not finding any easy pickings, it scouted around the fence trying to find a way into the yard.

I was yelling at the dog while I took pictures, telling it to get away but it was focused on its quest for more chicken meat. DH had gone into the house to get his gun. A fat little boy roared up on his four-wheeler and demanded to know why I was yelling at his dog. I told him his dog had killed two of our chickens and my husband was getting a gun so he’d better get his dog and lock it up while he could. Strangely, he said, “I’ll tell my Daddy,” and roared off across the cotton field toward a man on a tractor.

When DH came out, I told him about the boy and pointed to the man out in the field. We waited and watched the dog continue to test our fence. The boy did not return. The man continued to drive his tractor thru the fields away from us. Maybe fifteen minutes passed. The black dog proceeded to dig under the fence and got halfway under it before DH said, “Damn,” and shot it dead.

We chained up the retriever thinking that if no one claimed it, we would keep it and train it to protect our chickens from other dogs. Eventually, the farmer drove up on his tractor and demanded, “Why’d you kill my dog?”

We told him; showed him the paw prints inside the yard where the dog had started to dig under the fence, showed him the feather explosions, showed him the photos I’d taken of the dog’s behavior.

“Damn,” the man said, “I’m not getting any more black dogs. Last one I had did the same thing and I had to put him down. Glad I didn’t have to do it this time. Least, my kids’ll be mad at you instead of me. I know you had to do it. Once a dog tastes chicken there’s no going back. Hellava way to meet a new neighbor, ain’t it? I’m sorry ‘bout this. What do I owe you for the chickens?”

Of course, we professed our genuine sorrow and thanked him so much for understanding. That’s the way it is in the country: You just don’t mess with a man’s stuff and everyone understands the consequences of dogs killing chickens. He told us the owners of the other dog and said he’d let them know we had it. They came later and were so grateful we hadn’t shot their dog, too. We explained how her dog hadn’t shown any interest in the chickens or acted guilty. All the same, she said she’d pen the dog up and not let him roam around anymore.

When it was all over, DH put his head in his hands and grieved. “When I left Vietnam, I swore to myself I’d never kill another living thing. Now I’ve killed two chickens and a dog all because I insisted on having roosters.”

I felt guilty, too. I ran the whole sequence of events thru my mind. I go back to the point where I began to feel that Little Red was evil. After he attacked Big Red, I shouldn’t have waited to discuss the situation and expected my husband to do the killing. I should have followed my impulse, gone back out and chopped him up with a hoe. Then, maybe Whitey wouldn’t have gotten bad habits and Jack might not have lost his eye. The two blameless Rocks would still be sitting with the hens. And the kid’s dog would still be alive, feeding undetected on the large flocks that roam free on the other side of the road. But, it really does start back at the beginning with too many roosters.

#Too Many Roosters #roosters #chickens #hens #dominance games

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butterflyinthewell · 6 years ago

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LEGACY OF GOJIRA

My headcanon for the Heisei era timeline pre- and post-Godzilla vs King Ghidorah, and where my stuff fits in.

***

Blacklist “long post” if you don’t want this hogging up your dash. Tumblr mobile doesn’t have an option to use cuts and I just discovered desktop doesn’t let you edit posts created in mobile to insert a cut. Do not leave comments on this post complaining that it’s long or whatever, I already know that and tagged for it.

***

Now, some terminology to avoid confusion.

I will use Gojira when I’m speaking about the creature who appeared in 1954. He is the father of Godzilla.

And I will say Godzilla when speaking about the creature who appeared in 1984 onward. He is Gojira’s son. (His look changes movie to movie a bit, but in canon he has always looked however he looks in that given movie, with the exception of burning Godzilla, jsyk.)

Pre-Futurians:

A young adult godzillasaur charges into a battle between American and Japanese soldiers on Lagos island. It’s WW2. He chases the Americans away, but is wounded in the process and collapses on the forest floor. Shindo and his Japanese troops thank him, apologize for not being able to carry him and leave.

An elderly godzillasaur comes onshore with a whale in his mouth and finds his wounded son. He runs to the younger dinosaur’s side, manages to get him to eat the whale meat and tries to lick his wounds clean. Days go by. Infection sets in and becomes sepsis. The younger godzillasaur is definitely dying.

Then a morning arrives where a blinding flash goes off in the sky. Both dinosaurs have the scales melted off their bodies and they are soon covered in fallout ash. The younger dinosaur convulses and screams in pain. The older one holds his hand and conceals his agony behind a stoic visage. He stays by his son’s side until they both black out from the pain.

Gojira awakens weeks later aware that he is different. He looks to his son, who is breathing and unresponsive. Godzilla only moves to writhe, convulse and shriek in pain. Unimaginable anguish fills Gojira because this bright light made him and his only child suffer.

Weeks pass. He waits for his son to open his eyes and tells him to stay on the island. Godzilla always listens when told to stay somewhere. He is too sick and weak to move anyway. Gojira tells Godzilla he loves him and heads out to sea.

Fall arrives. It’s November 3, 1954, and Gojira crashes across Odo island. When he pops his head over the hill, he is telling the humans he will destroy them. He heads into Tokyo not long after. His rampage is an act of pure, spiteful revenge. Days later, he is killed by the Oxygen Destroyer. As he dies, he curses at the humans for the suffering they caused him.

Godzilla spends more time exposed to the radioactive fallout, so he grows a bit larger than his father although not by much. He wanders around Lagos island until the chill of winter arrives. He spends days calling for his father, but gets no answer. So he finally swims out to sea and spends the next several decades alternating between hibernating and absorbing radioactive waste in and around the island.

Finally, he had consumed all the radiation nearby and has to venture out to find more. He also hoped to find his father. So, in December of 1984, Godzilla made his presence known by attacking submarines, a nuclear power plant and finally coming ashore.

(My inserted headcanon) A young 13 year old Miki Saegusa was in the train car Godzilla picked up and dropped. She was the only survivor because her parents shielded her with their bodies.

Steven Martin was correct when he said Godzilla was looking for something. Unfortunately, what Godzilla sought could never be found because his dad is dead. Only Miki knows who he’s looking for.

The situation escalated, ultimately ending with the Super X destroyed and Godzilla plunging into Mt Mihara.

Godzilla was released from the volcano in 1989. He encounters Miki again, gets infected with the anti-nuclear energy bacteria and battles Biollante. After defeating her, he heads out to sea where he proceeds to be ravaged by the ANEB.

Enter the Futurians... Miki Saegusa is among the people from the 90s to go back in time...and here comes the fun part.

🌀🌀🌀🌀

Post-Futurians:

Godzilla is teleported off Lagos island and into the Bering sea at a randomly chosen time (1970s), where he lands on a bunch of nuclear waste and undergoes his painful mutation utterly alone. It’s more violent because the nuclear waste is more concentrated and toxic.

(My inserted headcanon) Miki returns to the present with the others. She feels a weird fracture in her memory, as if aspects of her past happened twice, but she doesn’t tell anyone because it’s too confusing to explain.

Behind her, history is repairing itself...

Gojira comes ashore on Lagos and can’t find his son. The nuclear bomb test happens as planned (which also created King Ghidorah from the abandoned Dorats, but it took a long time for him to grow up to size), and Gojira suffered through his mutation alone, too.

But he no longer had a reason to wait around, so he left the island as soon as he was strong enough to move without screaming in pain. He crosses Odo island and makes landfall in Japan in August instead of November.

When he pops his head over the hill, he is asking the humans if they saw his son or know where he is. They don’t understand, so he gets pissed and trashes Tokyo. He is killed by the Oxygen Destroyer. As he dies, he calls out for his son.

Far away in another time in the Bering sea, Godzilla wanders between unconsciousness and seizures and misery because his surroundings are so toxic. When the mutation process is complete, he is twice the size of his father. He wanders the seafloor, absorbing stray radioactive waste between long stretches of sleep.

The events of 1984 and 1989 play out the same, but people remember Godzilla as being 100 meters tall (328 feet).

(My inserted headcanon) Miki’s younger 1984 self is picked up in the train car as before, but now she senses Godzilla recognizing her and being confused as to why. He shows her images of herself as an adult in a jungle. Her 1989 encounter with him on the helipad dredges up the same confusion.

She lives her life up to the Futurians again, which closes the loop, and now she understands what happened and why she feels like she has lived her life up to that point twice. Past Miki and present Miki are now one and her feeling of fracture goes away.

Shindo sends a sub out to recreate Godzilla to fight King Ghidorah, but he doesn’t know Godzilla already exists until it’s too late.

Godzilla is gravely sick with the ANEB, but Shindo’s nuclear submarine powers him up enough to overcome the illness. He comes ashore in Japan and takes down King Ghidorah and kills the malicious Futurians who created King Ghidorah.

In typical Godzilla fashion, he goes stomping into Tokyo. He encounters Shindo in one of the skyscrapers he is about to knock down. Shindo, the man Godzilla sees as the person who deserted him to suffer through his mutation. He kills Shindo with his breath and comes face to face with Mecha-King Ghidorah. The battle ends with Mecha-King Ghidorah destroyed and Godzilla is plunged back into the sea.

Time has been rewritten, but Godzilla’s existence is a fixed point and cannot be overwritten. No matter what anyone does in the past, the universe will ensure Godzilla exists.

Shezilla happens in 1994 (movie year with inserted headcanon), a year after Godzilla battles Mothra and Battra.

Time splits 2 ways from the moment of her conception in a Petri dish. If the Doctor was flying the TARDIS through here, they will see a timeline split here, and the future they see depends on which branch in the timeline they follow after Shezilla enters the picture.

🌀🌀🌀🌀

BRANCH 1– ‘Canon’ timeline: Shezilla’s mutation overtakes her due to an underdeveloped nuclear gland. She dies. She and Godzilla had conceived a baby, but Shezilla was too sick to survive having it.

Godzilla takes her body to Challenger Deep because he doesn’t want predators to eat her. It’s a massive scientific loss, but there was no way to tend to her body with him hovering around.

He still thinks she will wake up because his heart stops and starts a lot due to his heart defect, and he doesn’t realize it’s an abnormality. Over the next month he tries feeding Shezilla from his own radioactive stores. Shezilla has what is essentially a coffin birth since Godzilla’s radiation was feeding the embryo instead of Shezilla. But the egg can’t survive the intense pressures and it is crushed instantly. Godzilla is totally crestfallen. He nuzzles Shezilla’s nose and the flesh sloughs off. She is decomposing.

Now Godzilla accepts that his mate and their baby are gone to the Stars. He leaves the seafloor in a state of mourning.

The Shrinking Project happens that same day. The man behind it has a vendetta against Gojira, so he’s taking it out on Godzilla.

Shezilla’s spirit possesses Miki Saegusa and tells her Godzilla must live. He has work to do. It takes time for her and Miki to understand each other, but once they do they work together to ensure Godzilla stays alive.

The same group of people behind the Shezilla project rescue Godzilla from the nasty person who only wants to torture him.

Godzilla isn’t doing well while tiny. He begins showing all the signs of acute heart failure. The Shezilla team figures out how to keep him alive by doing something dangerous and unprecedented. They patch the hole in his heart and ablate the underdeveloped nerve bundles that cause his arrhythmias, and he slowly returns to his normal size in short bursts after the shrink ray wears off. A confrontation between him and the nasty vendetta guy happens while he’s man-sized, and it doesn’t go well for vendetta guy.

Shezilla’s spirit can finally rest, so she departs into eternity after a moving goodbye to her mate.

History carries on through BabyGodzilla being found, Mechagodzilla, Fire Rodan, SpaceGodzilla and Destroyah.

BabyGodzilla grows up into LittleGodzilla and then Junior. Godzilla raises the little one as his own. He tells him all the stories his own father told him and imparts the knowledge of his kind’s history. Everything Gojira told Godzilla becomes known to Junior.

After battling Destroyah, Godzilla dies of a nuclear meltdown and his soul ascends to the Stars where Shezilla and a daughter are waiting. All that is left of his physical presence is a lump of corium.

Junior finishes his mutation into an adult godzillasaur. He takes the corium out to sea and lays it in next to Shezilla’s skeleton in Challenger Deep and grieves over them both for a long while.

Then he has to feed again, so he ascends to the surface and takes down an aircraft carrier transporting nukes. From that day on, Junior carries the legacy of Gojira alone.

🌀🌀🌀🌀

BRANCH 2– ‘Survival’ timeline: Shezilla gets very weak and sick because of an underdeveloped nuclear gland, but Godzilla is able to feed her massive, concentrated doses of radiation that allow the gland to achieve critical mass and keep her alive.

A small island becomes a dumping ground for radioactive waste, so the Godzilla family is more apt to go there. Their rampages into cities become extremely rare. Humanity is slowly learning to coexist with kaiju.

MechaGodzilla isn’t necessary and is never built. The metal from Mecha-King Ghidorah is used instead to reverse engineer its technology into things like quantum computers, medical devices, vehicles for space travel and safer nuclear power plants. The Shrinking Project doesn’t happen either because the tech is kept under lock and key and only a few people know where.

Shezilla nests and lays an egg. She and Godzilla are awakened awhile later by the sound of cracking. The egg hatches. It’s a girl with brown eyes. A kaijuologist who speaks Latin nicknames her Filia, which is Latin for daughter.

Junior’s egg is discovered while Rodan is away, so he is taken into human custody without incident. He hatches under Azusa Gojo’s watch and will grow up into a typical unmutated godzillasaur in a safe enclosure.

SpaceGodzilla happens in (movie time) 1995. He tangles with Rodan in the upper atmosphere and sends him crashing into Pripyat, Ukraine. His body falls into the Chernobyl power plant. He appears dead. Nobody will move him until because he is laying on the damage he caused and preventing radiation from leaking out.

When SpaceGodzilla lands, it’s Filia who curiously wanders over to check him out. She gets kidnapped and imprisoned in a crystal cage. Shezilla confronts SpaceGodzilla after hearing her daughter scream for help, and he utterly insults her mate by insisting he would be a better one. She gets enraged and fights him, but he overpowers her and leaves her seriously injured. Godzilla comes ashore after hearing Shezilla’s distress calls. Unfortunately, SpaceGodzilla is already gone. Godzilla. Is. Pissed. Off.

Shezilla recovers quickly. She and Godzilla both go on a rampage towards SpaceGodzilla. It’s a violent, bloody, nasty battle. SpaceGodzilla propositions Shezilla again. This time she says yes, and she seduces him as a trick. She gets SpaceGodzilla all the way to the point of climbing on top of her...and that’s when Godzilla knocks down the tower SpaceGodzilla is using as a power source. Shezilla flashes a grin at SpaceGodzilla and point blank trashes his shoulder crystals with her atomic breath. She kicks him off her, and her and Godzilla both kill him with their atomic breath. Filia is set free and all is well.

In 1996, reports indicate the radioactivity caused by Chernobyl has dropped to safe levels, safe enough that people can move back in.

Then a fireball is tracked over Hong Kong. It’s Fire Rodan, and he is burning up from too much nuclear energy. He decimates large parts of Hong Kong with his radioactivity and the sonic booms of flying by. At the same time, Destroyah is emerging from the water in Japan and causing havoc.

Filia, now the godzillasaur equivalent of a preteen, is awakened from her sleep by a telepathic call from Miki Saegusa and another girl, Meru. They lure her in to fight Destroyah. She’s up for the challenge.

Along the way, she meets Rodan, who mistakes her as the baby taken from his island a few years ago. She has no idea what he’s talking about and figures the runaway radiation is scrambling his brain. She tells him to hang back and off she goes to take on Destroyah.

Then her parents awaken to find her gone and set out in search of her. They end up tangling with Rodan, demanding to know what he did with their daughter. Rodan leads them to where Filia and Destroyah are duking it out at Haneda airport. Seeing her parents arrive distracts her just long enough for Destroyah to stab her in the chest and inject micro-oxygen directly into her nuclear gland. Destroyah throws Filia at her parents.

Filia is mortally wounded. Godzilla tries to feed her from his own radioactivity, but it doesn’t work. She’s too young and injured.

Shezilla goes berserk when she sees her daughter hurt like that. She charges Destroyah while Godzilla tries to save Filia. Rodan rages as well even though the exertion is raising his temperature to dangerous levels. He helps Shezilla battle Destroyah.

Filia apologizes to her dad for running off and stops breathing before he can tell her it’s okay. Godzilla screams when his little girl dies. He charges into the fray with tears pouring down his face and tells Destroyah he is going to wipe him off the earth.

Destroyah manages to cleave Rodan’s chest open with his horn. Now mortally wounded himself, Rodan glides towards Filia’s body and lands on top of her. He doesn’t realize she is dead and vows to guard her. His melting body pumps a massive dose of radiation into Filia’s corpse. She starts to breathe again and opens her eyes as the flesh melts off Rodan’s face. All that is left of him is his skeleton and a cloud of radioactive ash.

Destroyah is about to overpower Godzilla and Shezilla when the radioactive ash cloud surrounds them all. The radiation seeps into Godzilla and Shezilla, filling them with power.

A spiraling red atomic beam blasts in from one side. It’s Filia. Godzilla and Shezilla turn to Destroyah, who is now triangulated between an angry godzillasaur family. All 3 unleash simultaneous spiral red beams and Destroyah is reduced to nothing.

Godzilla and Shezilla are all over Filia, loving on her and crying when asking what happened. Filia answers that Rodan saved her and turns to indicate his empty skeleton. They all share a moment of silence for their unwitting fallen ally and return to the sea, leaving Tokyo to clean up the mess.

Things are uneventfully quiet. Filia grows up into a lovely adult godzillasaur. She separates from her parents by creating a den on the north side of the island. (Her parents are on the east side).

EarthCam sets up a few webcams on the island, playfully named Monster Island, in 2009. People all over the internet can log on and see the Godzilla family go about their lives.

The peaceful times break in 2011, when a massive 9.0 earthquake strikes Japan. A tsunami follows, and the destruction and fires are more massive than anything Godzilla or his family could do in that short period of time.

The earthquake damages an enclosure where the only living dinosaur, Junior, is kept. The enclosure is large and as close as possible to his natural habitat. Azusa Gojo is dragged kicking and screaming to evacuate before the tsunami arrives. When it does, it destroys the rest of the enclosure and the dinosaur stumbles free. He’s at home with the water and staggers towards the glow of a towering fire.

It’s Fukushima, and the reactors have melted down.

Junior gets hungry. He eats plants and fish around the burning nuclear power plant. He is exposed externally and internally to the radioactivity leaking out into the air, water and soil. His presence prevents helicopters from stopping a massive explosion of radioactive steam. Junior is right in the middle of it. His outer scales are burned off. Now in pain, he staggers away and falls unconscious into the receding tsunami waves. Humanity loses sight of him and assumes he perished.

Azusa tries to pull resources to search for Junior, but all efforts are focused on recovering from the disaster. She agrees despite how it hurts and accepts that the dinosaur she raised by hand is gone from her. Miki Saegusa senses what is going on. She keeps it to herself because humanity has meddled enough with the monsters and she wants them to live in peace. She focuses her powers on detecting and locating anyone missing after the disaster.

Weeks go by. Junior awakens to somebody nudging his shoulder. He is no longer a dinosaur. The mutation manifests differently on him because of the chemicals he ingested and came in contact with. His greenish-gray pitted skin and spiky dorsal spines are quite a sight, but it’s not his reflection in the water that he’s looking at.

The first thing Junior sees is a beautiful girl with brown eyes. Filia smiles and asks him if he’s okay. It’s love at first sight.

Ancient godzillasaurs has a tradition when it came to potential mates. Her dad told her all about it and she wants to uphold it, so she takes Junior to meet her parents.

Junior meets Shezilla first. He’s nervous and charming. She likes him immediately! Then Godzilla comes out to have a look. He’s huge and imposing even though his movements are jerky and stiff.

The moment they lock eyes is a tense one.

Godzilla asks Junior if he promises to treat his daughter’s heart like the treasure that it is. Junior swears on his life that he will. Godzilla tells Junior he better be impressive when he makes his move. Again, Junior swears that he will.

Godzilla nods his approval. He takes Junior’s hand, he takes Filia’s hand and clasps them together. Filia grins up at her dad. He tells her he’s happy for her. Then Godzilla and Shezilla stand together, watching their daughter and her future mate walk off.

Junior tells Filia his story of where he was all this time, and he mentions relating to how Shezilla feels like a young outsider. Filia says not to worry about it. Her dad didn’t worry about her mom’s mysteriously absent past, so she decided not worry so much about Junior’s.

Junior asks Filia to tell her story. She does. It’s a long tale stretching back millions of years. The sun goes down and the Milky Way is bright in the night sky. Junior is falling into her eyes. Filia is falling into his. He makes his move. Filia consents. They conceive.

Junior can’t stop thinking about the humans who took care of him and doesn’t know what happened to them after the ground shook. He slips away in the middle of the night, but he doesn’t recognize the disaster-ridden coastline when he arrives. He has a soft spot for humans because they were kind to him, so he locates a bunch of people swept away by the tsunami. Living and dead alike are gathered and placed on dry land where rescuers can reach them.

Junior finds Azusa on a balcony far inland. She recognizes him despite his mutated appearance, but she doesn’t understand his roar is telling her that he’s fine and about to be a dad. She cries instead, so he leaves and that is the last time they see each other.

A year later, Filia and Junior crouch by their nest and watch their egg hatch. It’s a boy with heterochromia. One eye is yellow, the other is brown. He has Junior’s facial features and Filia’s elegant long tail. He’s smaller than Filia was when she hatched. Kaijuologists nickname him Kage(kah-geh), which is Japanese for shadow, because his hide is black like one.

Kage falls out of his eggshell in a curled up position. It takes him a few days to walk and his hands are tight fists. The way he moves reminds Filia of her dad. And she is right, he inherited Godzilla’s heart issues and the subsequent neurological issues.

Kage is a grumpy little baby at first because he hatched in the winter and it’s cold. His parents keep him warm in their cave for the first few days until he’s able to shuffle around. His legs are much more affected than Godzilla’s, but he can walk if he goes slow and he’ll get a little better at it with time. He falls over a lot because he’s pigeon toed.

Filia and Junior are overwhelmed with joy because their baby didn’t keel over dead like they feared he might. They take Kage to meet his grandparents. Shezilla dotes on him immediately, and Godzilla is totally amazed to see another godzillasaur who Moves Like Him. He looks down at the baby godzillasaur and sees both his mother and father looking back at him through his grandson’s eyes.

Kage squawks a challenge because he can’t roar yet. Godzilla belly laughs as he comes to understand what his own father saw in him when he was little. Then he gets a goofy grin on his face because teaching Kage all the tricks to managing his Palsy will be so much fun! Kage will grow up surrounded by a loving family with a legacy as old as the sky.

And from his unseen place in the Stars, Gojira smiles proudly at all his son has achieved.

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#godzilla #heisei godzilla #shodaigoji #miregoji #headcanon #futurians #timeline silliness #long post #disability headcanon

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ebola-kun · 5 years ago

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The measurements of Spider-Man's feets, the sound of (older) music and also what the Romans in fact provided for ...

1. Baboons, like the British, like to queue

Baboons discover meals places by enjoying those around them. Yet receiving access to the food relies on the facility power structures of a baboon men, and those reduced down the hierarchy can easily wind up queuing for leftovers. Find out more

2. Sometimes, people are offered unlimited sauce by scientific research

Researchers gave volunteers an all-you-can-eat buffet of chicken korma along with three alternatives controlled to look as well as taste the exact same, however through which the fat deposits material supplied twenty% (reduced), 40% (channel) and 60% (higher) of the fats. They located that people that lug a particular genetic alternative consumed even more of the higher fat deposits meals-- although they said they all sampled the same. Review even more

3. You may fossilise a marinaded brain

A tiny brownish marble, located through an amateur fossil seeker in Sussex, is actually the first recognized example of fossilised brain cells from a dinosaur. The specimen, which likely belonged to a dinosaur identical to the Iguanodon, was thus well-preserved given that it was 'pickled' in an ancient overload. Learn more

4. Spider-Man will need to have measurements 145 shoes to go up a wall surface

By researching geckos, the most extensive pets able to size smooth vertical wall surfaces, scientists point out that an individual will need to have unmanageably huge sticky footpads to stroll up a wall structure like Spider-Man-- footwear in European measurements 145 or even US measurements 114. Learn more

5. The true North-South divide remains in how our team articulate 'scone'...

Regional diversity in dialect words and also pronunciations might be decreasing as much of England falls much more according to exactly how British is communicated in Greater london as well as the south-east, according to end results from the English Dialects App. Exactly how you articulate 'bun' still relies on where you live. Learn more

6. ... Though our team still don't understand how a wolf would certainly pronounce it

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7. No one truly recognizes what takes place to an egg after day 7

Growing eggs in a laboratory is actually difficult, as well as up until this year no one has managed to surpass day 7. However our scientists dealt with to fix this issue this year-- and also it is actually opened up an argument concerning whether our team must prolong the legal restriction for embryo research study past the current 14 day limit. Learn more

8. You can organize 128 ping pong balls 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 different techniques

The answer to an overwelming natural science problem could possibly help our company understand concerns ranging from forecasting the buildup of deserts, to making expert system even more dependable. Or even perhaps a quite uninteresting sensible for an unlucky student. Find out more

9. The response to Monty Python's "What have the Romans ever before provided for our company?" is "Spreading parasites".

The Romans might possess taken our company cleanliness, however as opposed to creating our company healthier, they aided boost the escalate of intestinal parasites such as whipworm, roundworm and Entamoeba histolytica. Find out more

10. One day, our experts might all of be actually residing in metropolitan areas crafted from bone tissue ...

Simply because our experts can build our areas away from steel and also concrete, does that way our team should? Is it time our team appeared at completely brand-new techniques of building cities? Designers functioning in biomimetics-- actually 'replicating lifestyle'-- are building samples of artificial bone and eggshell that might be utilized as clinical implants, and even be actually sized up and also made use of as low-carbon building materials. Learn more

11. ... And in wooden high-rise buildings

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12. Elvis Presley assisted exterminate polio in the USA

Back in the 1950s, hygienics advocates recruited the Master of Rock 'n' Roll to aid bring up recognition of the significance of shot against polio. A little a lot less talk as well as a bit even more vaccination, maybe? Learn more

thirteen. We have actually gone to war for even longer than our experts believed

Our archaeologists found the fossilised bone tissues of a team of prehistoric hunter-gatherers who were actually massacred around 10,000 years ago in Kenya. They have actually delivered distinct proof of an intense encounter in between conflicting teams of historical hunter-gatherers, and also proposes that also late Stone Age seeking societies fought. Documentation of a prehistoric carnage expands the background of warfare

14. If your pub serves white wine in big red or white wine glasses, you're a lot more most likely to become drunk due to the edge of the evening

Marketing red wine in much larger red or white wine glasses might promote people to drink additional, also when the quantity of red or white wine continues to be the same, according to a research which located that improving the measurements of red or white wine glasses caused a nearly 10% boost in red or white wine purchases. Learn more

15. Dune may sing

When solids flow like liquids they can easily create dune sing. As surfaces of sand slide down the side of particular dunes, they create resonances that may be heard for miles around. The dunes are vital with the sand of songs! Find out more

16. Your Labrador can not aid being fatty tissue-- it is actually genetically programmed to become greedy

Researchers found a genetic variant linked with being overweight and appetite in Labrador retrievers that might clarify why Labrador retrievers are actually most likely to come to be overweight than pets of other species. For every copy of the genetics lugged, the pet dog was actually on ordinary 1.9 kilograms bigger Learn more

17. There is actually a very exclusive cuckoo called Disco Tony

He is actually gray with a yellow ring around his eyes, he's travelled over 5,000 kilometers and also he is actually a cuckoo. However this is not merely any kind of cuckoo-- this is Disco Tony. He is one of a quite exclusive group of birds whose every relocation is actually being checked. Learn more

18. Einstein could have received it incorrect (presuming deep space contains at the very least five measurements)

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19. The Clangers would have appeared like plane engines when they were experiencing frisky

How is actually a mouse like a jet engine? The answer is actually in the method they create noise. Mice court each other along with ultrasound passion tracks that are actually faint to the individual ear, creating one-of-a-kind high regularity appears utilizing a system that has actually only earlier been actually observed in fast plane engines. Go through a lot more

twenty. A German scholar swiped a 1000 years of age part of music from our Collection in the 1840s. (Our company've got it back and our company right now recognize how it sounds.)

After some investigator work and also scrupulous investigation, the 11th century 'Cambridge Songs' were done for the first opportunity in 1,000 years back in Easter. Learn more

21. Man-made intelligence could help you shake off your worry of spiders without you also seeing

Making use of a blend of synthetic cleverness as well as brain scanning modern technology, researchers feel they can remove our worries without having to expose us to the very points our company're terrified of (which for a lot of became 2016). Find out more

22. People in Peterborough survived on stilts in the course of the Bronze Age

Over recent year, Should Ranch in the Cambridgeshire fens has actually generated Britain's largest selections of Bronze Grow older fabrics, beads as well as residential artefacts. Along with hardwoods of many roundhouses, the finds offer a sensational picture of an area growing 3,000 years ago-- little wonder it is actually been referred to as the 'Pompeii of the fens'. Learn more

23. Our experts could really be actually transforming the tide on dementia (however only in guys)

The so-called alzheimer's disease 'tsunami' may not be unpreventable. The UK has actually observed a twenty% fall in the occurrence of dementia over the previous 2 many years, depending on to our scientists. This has resulted in an approximated 40,000 fewer situations of mental deterioration than formerly forecasted-- but primarily in men. Read extra

24. You may learn A GREAT DEAL concerning the human brain only coming from reading Peter Pan

JM Barrie had a deep-seated understanding of the scientific research of cognition-- as well as was many years in advance of his attend determining vital phases of youngster advancement, apparently. Find out more To discover even more concerning how Cambridge's ideas and developments have shaped the planet over recent 800 years, view "Dearest World ... Yours, Cambridge" . To find out more about the most recent investigation from the College of Cambridge, please browse through our internet site .

This content was originally published here.

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quiethopesadoptioncenter · 3 years ago

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Papyrus Bittybones

Papyrus Bittybones: Naturally after the Sanses came the Papyri, created in July 2016. They are usually quite easy to take care of and helpful, a good starter bitty unless one decides to adopt an Underfell variant.

Honey (Underswap): Loves drinking honey, acts like he hates puns (but enjoys them), laid-back, used to smoke but quit for Berry (and he’s trying hard not to go back to smoking), rather lazy, can’t cook to save his life

Pyrus (human) Pyrus is a human Papyrus bitty. Like most Papyrus bitties tend to do, he tends to project many of his thoughts and feelings onto others as well as his faults and fears. He’s willing to follow along with the crowd rather than be left out as he has trouble accepting himself for whom he is and will deliberately change his opinions and ideas in order to better fit in. Pyrus desperately wants to have friends and be popular, but doesn’t think that others like him for who he is, and is much more observant and intelligent than he lets on. His favorite food is oatmeal with dinosaur eggs, though only Namu actually knows that. Appearance-wise, he’s got pale skin and white hair with reddish-orange eyes.

Pepper (Underfell) - Ambitious, tends to push others too hard, sadistic, believes violence is always the answer, wants to protect Cranberry and pretty much all Sans bitties

Dolphin (Undersplash) - Playful, innocent, very friendly to humans and monsters alike, more intelligent than he appears, dislikes sharks

Soufflé (Tendertale) - Good at baking cookies, rather timid, can and will put butterscotch over everything, likes hugs, enjoys playing games like Candyland

Sparrow (Angeltale) - Very social, enjoys making new friends, needs lots of space to fly around, vegetarian (eats only nuts, berries, and seeds), has some birdlike mannerisms

Andryrus (Undersoul) - Optimistic, high self-esteem, give him compliments and lots of hugs and kisses, unafraid of anything, somewhat reckless, needs constant supervision

Pumpkin (Underpie, based on pumpkin pie) - Kind, observant, tends to project his own feelings onto others, hardworking, caring, usually optimistic

Grief (Last Survivor) - Unstable, a little sadistic, intense hatred of humans, often has nightmares, pessimistic, tends to hallucinate about his deceased brother

Quietus (Reapertale) - Good with kids and animals, very gentle, usually optimistic, loves being praised, adores cats, can’t sleep without a plushie

Zero (Youtuber) - Runs a gaming channel, very encouraging, energetic, enjoys playing games of all kinds, easily scared when it comes to horror games, username is CoolSkeletonZero

Papper Jack (Cheesetale) Wearing a butter yellow onesie with little green, red, and brown spots of color on it is Papper Jack, Parmesan’s tiny baby bones of a brother. He cries whenever he is separated from his older brother Parmesan, and so the two come as essentially a package deal; if you wish to adopt one, then you must adopt the other as well. Being so young he is heavily reliant on his brother to care for him, though he is willing to bond with Gaster bitties.

Dragon (Spicefell, Pepper variant) This Pepper variant is as hot-tempered as a Papyrus can get, having the tendency to quite literally breathe fire when he’s angry. However, he is very much in control of his emotions and can often times appear to be stoic or uncaring, though when someone really pushes his buttons he is prone to exploding. Despite his great emotional and magical control, he will soften up slightly around Sans bitties and has no problem with larger animals. He is easily annoyed by children however, so it is advised that one doesn’t adopt this bitty if they had children or bitties younger than adolescents. Dragon is also very strict; he’ll make sure to keep his owner on schedule if they have one.

Tayberry (Tenderfell, Pepper variant) Tayberry bitties, while not as violent as Peppers much less Dragons, are a bit more volatile than the tightly-controlled Dragons. He doesn’t use violence normally, but would rather cut someone down to the bone with his words. If his words don’t work, then he will resort to using his magic though again he will restrain himself from harming anyone unless it’s completely necessary. He wears form-fitting clothing that accentuate his body and he can be unintentionally seductive sometimes. He isn’t as dominant as a Dragon nor a Pepper, though he can still play the alpha male; he has a stubborn streak however, and will not stand for anyone being treated unfairly.

Sweet Roll (Undertale) A ‘classic’ Papyrus bitty, Sweet Roll is energetic and kind. He can cook, with his passion being Italian, and his favorite food is oatmeal. He has the ability to defy gravity so don’t be surprised if you find him on top of your counter when previously he was on the floor. He is a stickler for cleanliness and always gives one hundred and ten percent no matter what he is doing, though is very loathe to hurt anyone. He loves affection, especially kisses and snuggles, though he prefers to be given them since he’s a bit shy about asking. He also adores various types of puzzles, but strongly dislikes word jumbles as well as hot weather, preferring the cold instead.

Softie (Swapfell) With the laid-back nature of a Honey bitty and the diligence and affection-seeking traits of a Sweet Roll, Softie is unquestionably loyal and obedient. He usually takes suggestions as orders even if not coming from an Edgeberry bitty, which may confuse or unnerve other Sans bitties, but that is the life he’s become used to. He’s uncomfortable when put in a position where he needs to issue orders, though he will put up with it for a short time. He does occasionally have nightmares when he tries to sleep; typically soothing music helps with his insomnia and allows him to rest without having any such dreams.

Pear (Caketale) This Papyrus bitty specializes in making pear cake and shares quite a bit in common with both his Underpie and Undertale counterparts. However, where his counterparts are more likely to wear orange and red-orange scarves respectively, Pear has opted for a more subdued light green scarf to differentiate himself further. He has no shortage of energy to give and tends to go out of his way to befriend others even though they might seem unapproachable or mean. He is a pacifist in nature, never raising a hand to harm others even if it would be in self-defense. Because of this, other more protective bitties are prone to taking up the position of a bodyguard for him no matter how much he might insist it isn’t necessary.

Bites (Horrortale) Having had to live with very little food for a long time, Bites has had to suffer through scavenging what little he and his brother Nibbles have found. Though he is more than happy to share food with others, he’s never had more than a stray fruit for himself. His teeth, though crooked, are on their way to being straightened with braces. He is prone to bursting into tears when others (and especially his owner) offer to share food with him as it means so much more to him than it might to other monsters due to food being terribly scarce. Unlike other Papyrus bitties, he doesn’t flinch at the thought of harming a human though he won’t go out of his way to do so. He prefers warmer weather to cold weather and it’s very important that he’s reminded that he’s loved. He’s also really insecure about his appearance.

Pitch (Chesstale Papyrus) Pitch bitties are as straightforward and to the point with their feelings as one would expect a rook to be; they are very emotionally clever and capable of reading others with ease. They are also quite protective of the Sables they are paired with, but unfortunately cannot be around them as much as they would like to due to busy schedules. Pitch bitties tend to be very clean and organized, and push themselves hard in anything they set their minds to. They do tend to worry over their respective Sables and are willing to drop everything in order to care for them should they be suffering from burnout. Pitch bitties also have a hard time falling asleep due to having active minds; establishing a wind-down routine usually helps. It's not uncommon during one of their sleepless nights for a Pitch to occupy himself with puzzles or do some cleaning. These bitties often put forth a cheerful, optimistic front for others, but will show their real emotions around those they know can keep a secret.

Sheaf (Inktale Papyrus) These bittybones are effectively the more relaxed, albeit more realistic counterpart to Artisan bitties. While they don't consider themselves to be very artistic, one thing they do specialize in is making beautiful collages. Most of these are of memories that they share with their respective Artisan so that their brothers have something that they can use to jog their often awful memory, though it's not uncommon for them to make more personal collages for themselves or others. Like Artisan types, Sheaf bitties do not technically have souls and feel things to a much lesser degree than a normal monster, so they must rely on other methods to be able to experience stronger emotions. Because of this, they carry around colorful paper that they'll nibble on. Every color of paper corresponds to a different emotion. Even though chewing on paper is about as easy as drinking paint, it does seem to help. It's also not uncommon for a Sheaf bitty to take up cooking, though they'll often mix paint or other inedible objects into the food.

Gene (Megalosomnia Papyrus) Well-versed in political matters and quite competent in quelling conflicts that escalate into physical fights, Gene bitties are quite strong. They don't sleep much, but more so than their brothers. However, they don't spend as much time together with said brothers as other Papyrus types might due to their brothers being workaholics (which often results in Gene bitties becoming quite lonely and mourning about how busy their brothers are). Despite their strength, these Bittybones are still averse to using violence when they can avoid it and will often instead separate the two parties via whatever means necessary until they can calm down and won't hesitate to use blue magic to achieve this feat. They also tend to be worriers, especially when it comes to their brothers' welfare, and while not the greatest of cooks they won't hesitate to bring their brothers meals if they skip out for whatever reason. It's not uncommon for Genes to be quite fond of dogs.

Toffee (Candytale Papyrus) While this bitty's toffee armor might be all hard edges, you'd be hard-pressed to find a bitty with a softer (metaphorical) heart. Toffee bitties have somewhat strange taste in foods as they like to sprinkle sugar on everything, including foods that really shouldn't have sugar on it to begin with. To the surprise of absolutely no one, they love their sweets and will happily consume as much sugar as possible to keep themselves awake (though toffee bars are usually a favorite). Like many Papyrus Bittybones, they are highly energetic and like to always be getting things done with a notorious dislike for laziness or mess. They are naturally meticulous about keeping their battle body safe and sound when not wearing it because they don't want anyone to find and start eating it. Toffee bitties also heavily dislike sour candy, refusing to have it anywhere in their home and only reluctantly accepting its presence should a guest bring some with them.

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sciencespies · 4 years ago

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The trouble with dinosaur bones

https://sciencespies.com/nature/the-trouble-with-dinosaur-bones/

The trouble with dinosaur bones

Bloodsucking insects, trapped in amber for millions of years, extracted for their blood-filled bellies, with the blood analyzed for ancient DNA.

At first glance, the scientific explanation for the revival of dinosaurs in Jurassic Park doesn’t sound too far-fetched. It was considered a genuine possibility at the time the book was written.

There’s just one problem – trapped in amber or not, DNA doesn’t like to stick around. Even in the best conditions, scientists estimate that readable DNA completely degrades in 1.5 million years, tops.

The asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs occurred 65 million years ago, so there are tens of million years in the interim, which means plenty of DNA degradation.

Any scientist you care to ask will tell you that Jurassic Park is the only place you’ll see dinosaurs cloned any time soon. But that’s not to say paleontologists are in total agreement about what constitutes the world’s oldest decipherable genetic material.

“Saying you can clone a dinosaur – it’s Jurassic Park, it’s not science,” paleobiologist Alida Bailleul from the Chinese Academy of Sciences told ScienceAlert.

“We’re not doing this to clone a dinosaur … we’re just trying to understand if we can get access to some of the genetic material.”

Bailleul has become one of the faces of the discussion in this area of paleontology, after discovering what she believes could be the oldest partially intact DNA ever found in a specimen of the dinosaur Hypacrosaurus.

Skeletal mount of Hypacrosaurus altispinus. (Etemenanki3/Wikimedia/CC BY-SA 4.0)

In the last few decades, myriad discoveries have pushed back the date of the oldest readable genetic material.

In 2013, a 700,000-year-old horse fossil frozen in permafrost became the oldest DNA ever sequenced. Before that, the oldest sequenced genome was from the remains of an 80,000-year-old Denisovan.

Then, earlier this year, scientists announced they’d sequenced DNA from a 1.2-million-year-old mammoth tooth – which currently holds the record for the oldest recovered and sequenced DNA.

Because of the fragility of DNA, some scientists think that might be the oldest we’re going to get, at least in terms of decipherable genetic material that’s not so degraded as to be worthless.

DNA has a half-life of 521 years, meaning that after 521 years, half of the bonds in its molecular backbone break. After 1,042 years, half of that remainder would be gone, too.

In absolutely pristine conditions, the last bond would break after 6.8 million years, but you’re likely to have a lot of trouble reading anything at all after about a million years, researchers say.

“I don’t think anything more than that could be trusted,” ancient DNA expert Sally Wasef from Griffith University in Australia told ScienceAlert.

“And it’s not just that it can’t be trusted. It’s about how much information it’d provide you. It might be a little piece preserved, but would it be enough to provide you with good information?”

Every human’s genome is made up of 3.2 billion ‘base pairs’, the building blocks of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) that code our genetic instructions. Every living thing on the planet uses these DNA base pairs to store their genetic information, and most mammals have a similar number of base pairs to code our every hair, flipper, or horn.

To work out most physical differences between two people, you can analyze tiny changes to these base pairs called single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). In some diseases, only one SNP will be changed, while eye color can involve a handful, and some population-wide traits can take hundreds of these tiny changes.

To think about it another way, if you provided a sample of your DNA to a genetics testing company such as 23andMe, they’d look at 640,000 of your SNPs – which sounds like a lot, but they’re only actually analyzing about 0.02 percent of the whole genome.

With so much complexity in a genome, it gets complicated quickly if billions of those base pairs become degraded, leaving only parts of the puzzle behind offering physical genetic information.

Hypacrosaurus altispinus restoration. (ABelov2014/CC BY 3.0)

Wasef uses the analogy of our DNA being like a computer hard drive. “If the hard drive is in a safe place where it’s not exposed to a lot of factors that damage it, it will be well preserved,” she explains.

“But, once this hard drive gets attacked by viruses, you start to eat into your data.”

Even the very well-preserved 700,000-year-old horse DNA was corrupted enough that it had to be painstakingly stitched back together by University of Copenhagen researchers, while simultaneously removing any bacterial DNA that had been mixed in and also extracted.

In the end, despite their efforts, the team – lead by anthropobiologist Ludovic Orlando – only managed to recover 73 proteins, a far cry from the 20,000 or so that make up the entire horse genome.

Of course, identifying 73 proteins is a great achievement if you want to analyze genomic changes in horse species throughout the ages. But to attempt something like cloning, you’d need to know every single base pair in the genome – so we won’t be seeing any ancient horse species galloping around any time soon.

Cloning a dinosaur, then, is well and truly off the table, and given the finite lifetime of DNA, it doesn’t seem likely that there would be any useful dinosaur DNA left to find anyway.

However, Bailleul and her team recently discovered something that has triggered both excitement and skepticism in the ancient DNA research community – signs of DNA inside a dinosaur fossil, millions of years past its use-by date.

While analyzing a baby dinosaur called Hypacrosaurus from the late Cretaceous period, they found incredibly well-preserved cartilage. Inside the cartilage, they discovered cell-like structures that included material resembling DNA in the tests conducted.

“We isolated some cells of the dinosaur and we stained them with DNA stains,” Bailleul says.

“Inside the dinosaur cells, it looks like there’s still some material that’s reacting with the DNA stain.”

(Bailleul et al., National Science Review, 2020)

Above: Chromosome-like structures from the Hypacrosaurus dinosaur.

There’s only one problem: The dinosaur in question is between 74 and 80 million years old – much too old to still have intact DNA.

Because of this, the findings caused some controversy in the paleontology world, with many researchers believing that the sample is just too old to be genuine dinosaur DNA, with the results likely reflecting some form of modern genetic contamination in the samples instead.

Unfortunately, there’s no way to check the result. When working with a very tiny amount of potential DNA, the methods scientists use are destructive – meaning that the samples are destroyed while they’re being analyzed.

In other words, you have to know what you’re aiming to achieve before you get started.

“It has to be a very good aim, or you’re just wasting the sample to prove DNA can live,” Wasef explains.

Despite other researchers’ doubts, Bailleul still thinks it’s real dinosaur DNA her team found – not contamination of the samples.

“Everybody says, ‘Okay, there is no more DNA after 1 million years, it gets too degraded, too modified, you can’t get anything.’ And then yet, here we have this sample,” she says.

“It doesn’t make scientific sense to say it’s contamination … [The contaminated DNA] wouldn’t just be inside the cell. It would also be all around.”

But DNA isn’t the only way to find genetic information about ancient creatures.

In 2019, the same team that analyzed the horse DNA announced they had extracted genetic information from the tooth enamel of a 1.77-million-year-old species of rhino.

Instead of looking at the DNA itself, the team analyzed the proteins, determined the amino acids, and reverse-engineered a small DNA sequence out of that information.

“People are looking at the ancient protein as a new tool to go where the ancient DNA stops,” says Wasef.

Unfortunately, ancient protein has similar issues to degraded DNA. You can tell some information from reconstructing DNA from protein, but it’s only a small (and not exact) sample of the genome.

For example, each base pair (or letter) in a genome works with the base pairs next to it to make larger and larger structures. Groups of three base pairs code for specific amino acids, which then code for specific proteins. But there are redundancies and duplicates in this code, so working backwards is complex.

“The combination of letters of DNA can make different amino acids, and those different amino acids can make the same protein,” Wasef explains.

“So, you can’t really translate the same protein back to DNA.”

DNA transcription, translation, and protein folding. (Biology Corner/CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

Despite these issues, many scientists think ancient protein truly is the next frontier of researching ancient genetics. You can still retrieve important information from these fossilized proteins, and some information is better than nothing.

In 2016, scientists found 3.8-million-year-old proteins in ostrich eggs. Although the protein wasn’t sequenced in that case, it still shows that protein has a much longer shelf life than DNA.

Right now, the techniques we have available for analyzing proteins are expected to push the age of the oldest genetic sequencing back a few million extra years, although it remains to be seen whether this will extend all the way back to the reign of the dinosaurs.

Nonetheless, both Wasef and Bailleul think the technologies empowering ancient genetics research are rapidly getting better. Just because we can’t do it today doesn’t mean we won’t be able to tomorrow.

“When people ask me, ‘Is it impossible to get ancient DNA from dinosaurs?’, I say yes,” Wasef explains.

“But when I started doing ancient DNA in 2009, what we’re doing now was considered impossible.”

#Nature

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mspaleoart · 7 years ago

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Gastornis - Paleocene-Eocene (56-45 Ma)

Happy December 26th, everyone! Did you know I can’t draw birds? Neither did I, but I persevered anyway. Today’s animal is Gastornis.

Gastornis is one of the bigger birds that lived after the dinosaurs’ extinction, and lived in western Europe, the western US, and China. It was a weird bird, with a large skull and heavy beak. Its wings were tiny, and its legs were short and stocky. It was about as tall as an adult person. It’s famous as the terror of the early Cenozoic forests, but that isn’t exactly true, as I’ll talk about below.

It took us a while to figure out what was going on with Gastornis. We thought it was a carnivore for a long time, since it was so big and similar to other, definitely predatory birds. But after reconsidering the shape of its beak (it doesn’t have a hook at the end, like most predatory birds) and structure of its feet, it’s been reclassified as an herbivore. So, really, picture a really big turkey.

An American species of Gastornis was found shortly after the initial European remains, by none other than Edward Drinker Cope. He didn’t recognize it as a Gastornis, so he called it Diatryma, which ended up getting pretty popular until we figured out it was really a Gastornis.

Even though it looks like some sort of ostrich or cassowary, a study from 2007 suggests they were actually closely related to the ancestors of waterfowl. Also, since I don’t know where else to put this, it might have laid REALLY fucking big eggs. Like, one and a half times larger than ostrich eggs.

You all probably know where I learned about this one from. Yeah it was in Walking With Beasts, where it terrorizes some Propalaeotherium while some giant ants eat its baby. I think it also gets in a fight with another Gastornis for… some reason. Walking With really had a penchant for making apex predators fight each other. Anyway, pretty much none of that was scientifically accurate, but oh my god, did I think it was badass as a kid. I remember pretending to be a Gastornis on the playground at school, even. I was kind of weird. Anyway, I think it’s cool that my childhood ideas about paleontology have been challenged by scientific progress. I love feathered dinosaurs and short Spinosaurus, and Gastornis the seed-eater. I’d rather know these animals as they are than what I wanted them to be as a kid. After all, extinct animals aren’t big awesome monsters. They’re just animals that aren’t around anymore.

#gastornis #birds #paleocene #eocene #paleogene #cenozoic #paleoblr #palaeoblr #paleontology #palaeontology #paleoart #palaeoart #prehistoric

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amoebaetta · 8 years ago

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Perry the Platypus!

When you think of platypuses, you probably think of something like this:

And while this guy is super cool, that’s not really an accurate representation of platypuses.

The Ornithorhynchus anatinus, or as we know them, the platypus, is only about fifteen inches tall, and weighs in at about three pounds! Modern science has found though, that ancient platypuses were way larger than their descendants. Ancient platypuses were probably about three feet long, and lived even way back when the dinosaurs did. During the Cretaceous period, platypuses were probably around, and other than a size change, they haven’t really evolved that much. When scientists in Britain were first brought the platypus in about 1797 from Australia, they thought it was a fake. They believed that someone had sewn a duck’s bill onto a mammal’s body. Then, they realized that this mammal laid eggs! Some were convinced it was a reptile, but now we know better. The platypus is one of the very last species of mammal to lay eggs. This is called a monotreme.

The way platypuses reproduce is very strange too. The male platypus will chase the female platypus till he bites her tail and then the two of them mate. In about three weeks, the mother will crawl deep into the ground, shut herself in there and lay one, two, or rarely three soft eggs with her babies in them. She keeps the eggs warm for a little over a week before they are hatched. Then her babies will drink her milk, but she has no nipple for them to latch onto. Instead, the milk basically comes out how our sweat comes out, and the babies lick it off of her.

Platypuses are in only one part of the world. They live in Tasmania and the eastern coast of Australia, and their ancestors probably lived in South America back during Pangaea. Even though they only live in that tiny part of the world, they can survive in most climates. They have waterproof, thick fur which allows them to be in the water for most of their lives, but because the fur is so thick, they can even live in the chilly climate of the Australian Alps. Typically though, when they live near the water, their burrows look like this:

The taxonomic classification of these animals goes as such:

Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Mammalia Order: Monotremata Family: Ornithorhynchidae Genus and species: Ornithorhynchus anatinus

Platypuses are carnivores, so they eat the fish and other meat at the bottom of whatever fresh-water source they live at. They scoop up their food, plus rocks and gravel from the bottom of the water source, store it in their cheek pouch and then use the gravel to mash up their food because they have no teeth. Platypuses only have teeth when they are babies, and these teeth will soon fall out and be replaced by soft “gums”. As for the food they eat, they have to eat a lot of it! With such an active lifestyle, the platypus needs to eat over half its body weight in food every night (and yes, night is appropriate because they are nocturnal!).

Thanks for tuning in this week with etta’s science!

~Sources~

https://blog.everythingdinosaur.co.uk/blog/_archives/2008/01/23/3480544.html

https://www.livescience.com/27572-platypus.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Platypus

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floraexplorer · 6 years ago

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Everything I Learnt Backpacking Bolivia in Three Months – A Traveller’s Guide

I spent an unforgettable three months backpacking Bolivia.

Bolivia is one of the cheapest countries in South America for backpackers – particularly compared to its neighbours in Chile and Argentina. Many visitors travel Bolivia for the Salt Flat deserts, the witches markets in the breathlessly high city of La Paz, and the mysterious Lake Titicaca – the world’s highest navigable lake.

But there’s so much more to see in Bolivia.

I chose to spend three months backpacking Bolivia, and my Bolivia itinerary was scattered and circuitous. I volunteered in La Paz, fell in love in Sucre, drank local wine in Tarija and stepped inside dinosaur footprints in Parque Torotoro. I danced under the full moon beside Illimani mountain and lived in a tiny village without running water. I hugged llamas beside the highest lake in the world and slept within walls made of salt.

When I think back to the three months I spent backpacking Bolivia, it’s just as easy to remember tiny moments and details. Crisp blue skies. Brightly patterned textiles. Sunburnt cheeks. I remember chewing coca leaves to alleviate the light-headed sensation I felt in high altitude. I remember queuing for breakfast at Sucre’s Mercado Central each morning, squashing onto a plastic stool to eat papa rellena with a chipped spoon.

Whether I was travelling in cities, villages, canyons, deserts or worryingly rickety buses, I found Bolivia to be one of the most fascinating, frustrating, hilarious, eye-opening countries I’ve ever travelled through.

To put it simply, Bolivia is an incredible place.

Things to know about backpacking Bolivia

What’s the weather in Bolivia like?

Because much of Bolivia is at a high elevation, it’s hot in the fierce daytime sun and cold at night. That means plenty of suncream and plenty of layers! It’s also advised to carry a waterproof because the weather can turn pretty quickly.

What’s the best time of year to visit Bolivia?

Most recommend the dry winter season of May-October for travelling in Bolivia, as opposed to the rainy summer season of September-March.

I didn’t know this beforehand, so I was travelling in Bolivia between September and December; the tail end of the cooler months, transitioning into spring. That said, the altitude affects everything: September in La Paz (altitude of 3,640m) was warm in the bright sun but chilly in the shade. My next month in Sucre felt like constant springtime, despite being October, and the tail end of the year ranged from freezing (Potosi, at 4,067m) to balmy (Tarija at 1,866m).

Some destinations, like the Salar de Uyuni, can change drastically depending on the time of year. If you visit in March/April you’re most likely to catch the ‘mirror effect’, when high rainfall allows the Salt Flats to reflect the sky. However, that same rain also makes it harder to visit Fish Island. Most people visit the Salar de Uyuni between May and October – lots of sun, and not much rain.

What food can I eat in Bolivia?

For a country highly focused on grains and potatoes, I still really enjoyed the food in Bolivia – although if you’re vegetarian then it might require some research. That’s because, as in most of South America, meat is a staple part of most plates of Bolivian food, and asking for a meal without meat will often confuse people.

Here are some of my favourite typical Bolivian foods:

Salteñas – little hard pastry shells filled with meat, vegetables and gravy, which you can buy at the side of the road. The gravy inside has a tendency to spill everywhere, so the trick is to bite off the top then drink the gravy before eating the rest.

Papas rellenas – a ball of fried mashed potato with egg, meat or vegetables in the centre, topped with spicy onion and tomato sauce. Because it needs to be eaten from a bowl, papas rellenas is usually bought and eaten at a market, where you’ll squash onto a plastic stool amongst the other customers and hand back your bowl when you’ve finished.

Tucumanas – these deep-fried pastries are the larger version of a salteña. Make sure to ladle on the various sauces available at a street food stand – or enjoy them with a delicious side salad at Condor Cafe in Sucre!

Buñelos – this fried cheese snack is oily as anything but seriously delicious.

Pique macho – if you’re feeling the after-effects of the night before, you should opt for this hangover-worthy plateful of French-fry style chips and bitesize slices of steak, along with onions, hard-boiled eggs, mustard, mayo and ketchup.

You should also get used to eating an almuerzo each day: a set meal of two courses eaten at lunchtime, which usually includes a bowl of soup and a segundo of meat, vegetables and rice, along with a postre (dessert) and a glass of juice. The almuerzo is usually the cheapest thing on the menu as the working Bolivan day revolves around it: restaurants are packed between 12-3pm and it’s the best place to mix with plenty of local Bolivians.

Finally, markets are a way of life in Bolivia. If you spend more than a few days in any location I’d suggest frequenting your closest food market to do your food shopping and barter for some fresh produce. It’s a great way to practice your Spanish too!

Read more: eating traditional Bolivian food in Sucre

What’s the political climate in Bolivia like?

Generally speaking, most Bolivians are hospitable and friendly (although many aren’t the smile-on-first-meeting type). However, Bolivia itself is a very politicised country so protests, marches and blockades are pretty common. They’re usually peaceful – I spent a morning in La Paz chatting to nurses and medical staff who were out on the streets to protest for higher pay – but sometimes it can become more violent, involving tear gas from police and objects thrown by protestors.

Is Bolivia safe for backpackers travelling alone?

Bolivia is quite a poor country but isn’t particularly unsafe. You just have to keep your wits about you, trust your gut instincts, and take care of your valuables.

– Ask questions before paying for things. As tourism increases in Bolivia, there are more untrustworthy tour companies and guides – so ask plenty of questions before handing your money over.

– Watch out for scams. There are also a number of common scams in Bolivia including the ‘false police’ scam, which involves a policeman asking for your ID and then demanding payment of a fine. If you’re ever stopped by the police in Bolivia, demand to see a warrant and contact your Embassy.

– Don’t take drugs. As one of the world’s largest cocaine producing countries, Bolivia’s drug problem is ever-present. Travellers are often attracted to a legendary underground cocaine bar in La Paz called Route 36 (found by asking a taxi driver to drive you to its ever-changing location); however, backpackers in South America should be aware that being caught with cocaine in Bolivia could carry a sentence of up to ten years in San Pedro prison. This La Paz destination was made famous thanks to a memoir called Marching Powder which was written by a British inmate in 2011, and the book has prompted hundreds of tourists to queue up outside the prison and attempt to tour it.

Conversely, the laws surrounding hallucinogenic substances like ayahuasca and the San Pedro cactus are more blurred. Both substances can be seen for sale at the Witches Market in La Paz – but from personal experience, I’d recommend against buying them yourself, and only partaking in ceremonies with trusted shamans.

Read more: my all-night dancing experience with the San Pedro cactus

Do I need travel insurance for Bolivia?

Yes, absolutely! You should have comprehensive travel insurance when backpacking South America – or anywhere, for that matter. I usually use World Nomads as it’s designed for adventurous travellers.

Can I drink the water in Bolivia?

It’s definitely not a good idea to drink the tap water in Bolivia – stick to bottled, unless you’ve brought a filtration system you trust.

Do I need to speak Spanish in Bolivia?

Although it’s certainly possible to travel through Bolivia without any Spanish, there are significantly less English-speaking locals here than in other South American countries.

Luckily, Bolivia is also one of the best South American countries to learn Spanish, thanks to their clear and neutral accent, and it’s also one of the cheapest. Plenty of language schools offer individual or group classes: I spent a month taking daily one-on-one classes at Pico Verde in La Paz and improved from beginner to semi-fluent.

If you don’t have time for lessons, I’d still highly recommend using a phone app like DuoLinguo to practice on while you’re travelling in Bolivia, and at the very least try to have the basic greetings, numbers and simple conversational phrases written down somewhere.

I spent 18 months learning Spanish in South America –– read my ‘Spanish Challenge’ series here!

Travelling around Bolivia

What kind of transport can I take in Bolivia?

Travelling around Bolivia is almost exclusively via public bus. This can be both a blessing and a curse: the journeys are long but extremely cheap; the roads are stunningly scenic but full of potholes; the passengers and accompanying stories can be really fascinating, but often you’re worried that the drivers are drunk.

Apart from buses, there’s the option of private taxi hire, renting and driving your own car, or even taking the few train routes through the country. It’s also possible to fly between major cities to avoid the lengthly road distances – the bigger cities like La Paz, Sucre, Cochabamba and Santa Cruz are all connected by daily flights.

However, all of my Bolivian travels were by bus.

Bus routes and ticket prices in Bolivia:

La Paz to Sucre: 100 Bs for 10-12 hours, semi cama seat. This is usually an overnight journey, leaving 7pm and arriving 7am.

Sucre to Potosi: 15 Bs for 3 hours, normal seat, departing every hour.

Sucre to Tarija: 12 hours, costs 80 Bs, departs at 8pm and arrives 7am.

Potosi to Tarija: 80 Bs for 10 hours, semi cama seat, departing in the morning and evening.

Tarija to Tupiza: 80 Bs for 7 hours, semi cama seat. This overnight route is an infamously rough ride, so pack some anti-sickness pills.

Tupiza to Villazon (Argentinian border): 20 Bs for 2 hours, normal seat.

Uyuni to Potosi: 30 Bs for 5 hours, normal seat.

Potosi to Cochabamba: 60 Bs for 7 hours, semi cama seat.

Cochabamba to Torotoro National Park: 25 Bs for 5 hours, normal seat. This winding route has two daily departures at 6am and midday.

Cochabamba to Sucre: this 12 hour journey is on an unpaved road so you won’t sleep much.

Cochabamba to La Paz: 70 Bs for 9 hours, semi cama seat. There are six departures daily.

La Paz to Lake Titicaca: 40 Bs for a 3-4 hour journey on a normal seat.

La Paz to Uyuni: 12-15 hours, only overnight departures.

Read more: A guide to dealing with bus travel in Bolivia

Tips for bus travel in Bolivia:

– Buy your bus tickets at bus stations. Trying to decipher the online booking systems is nearly impossible and besides, you might get turned away with a blank stare unless you do it in person. Also this is the prime time to haggle and question the various company operators.

– Bring layers. There are always people selling garishly patterned blankets at bus stations, and for good reason: often the air con will be cranked up to freezing temperatures, so it’s worth having plenty of clothes to keep you warm. I often took my sleeping bag on board and used that.

– Aim for daytime journeys. On a long travel day, it’s worth having the scenery to stare out at (unless, like me, you have a strong fear of heights when driving the winding mountain roads!). There’s also enough cautionary tales about drunk and overtired drivers to warrant a daytime journey – not to mention stories of nighttime muggings and bus hijackings.

– Prepare for protests and road blockades. On our way into Cochabamba, our bus stopped 25km away from the city because the highway was filled with multiple blockades and protestors. We had no choice but to shoulder our bags and start walking – and all the other Bolivian passengers didn’t seem phased by this turn of events at all. As a result, I’d recommend bringing luggage you can carry relatively easily to Bolivia!

Where should I stay in Bolivia?

Bolivia has probably the cheapest accommodation in all of South America. There are plenty of cheap hostels in Bolivia to suit all kinds of backpackers, including various branches of the Wild Rover and Loki hostels (infamous party hostels in South America) and just as many budget hotels in the touristy areas.

It’s also possible to rent out apartments in Bolivia on Airbnb – sign up here and get £25 off your first booking!

Check Prices of Bolivia Hostels Here!

Hostels in Bolivia

Location Hostel Why stay here? La Paz Loki La Paz A definite party hostel, Loki still boasts good security and friendly staff. Their rooftop Skybar is pretty special too Sucre The Celtic Cross This chilled out Irish-run hostel is also a language school and has weekly BBQs for all guests Potosi Eucalyptus Hostel Great views of the city from the roof, a cosy reading area and warm showers (much appreciated in this chilly city!) Tarija Kultur Berlin Tarija Guesthouse This quiet, family-run place is close to the main plaza with a delicious breakfast Tupiza La Torre Hostel A combination hostel/hotel with fantastic tours on offer – for both the Salt Flats and southwest Bolivia in general Cochabamba Cabana Las Lilas This lovely place has a huge garden and a relaxed vibe – and Alex is the most helpful hostel owner you’ll ever meet! Torotoro Hostal Wilma A simple, clean hostel with a campsite attached. They also make boxed lunches! Lake Titicaca La Cupula Gorgeous views of Lake Titicaca from the individually designed rooms. There’s an amazing restaurant on site, a lovely sloped garden and hot tub too

How do I get in and out of Bolivia?

Because Bolivia is a landlocked country, you can either fly into one of the three international airports (located in La Paz, Cochabamba, and Santa Cruz) or you can cross overland at one of Bolivia’s borders – of which there are many.

– Flights: I flew into El Alto airport in La Paz, where I was given a 90 day visa on arrival. This was the most expensive flight I paid for in South America, but after hearing various stories I learned it was also the most foolproof way to get my visa.

– Border crossings: Bolivia shares borders with Brazil to the north and east, Paraguay to the southeast, Argentina to the south, and Chile to the southwest and Peru to the northwest. I attempted to cross into Argentina at Villazon to renew my Bolivian visa but it didn’t quite work (read more about exactly why here). Luckily, my eventual departure from Bolivia was more successful – I crossed into Peru via Lake Titicaca (although I almost lost my passport to the lake waters because an overly cocky Peruvian border guard thought it’d be funny to dangle it…)

In total, there are thirteen places to cross in and out of Bolivia. These are the most popular border crossings:

To/from Brazil and Paraguay: Santa Cruz is the best city to catch buses to these borders – either to Corumba in Brazil, or to Asuncion in Paraguay along the Trans-Chaco Highway.

To/from Argentina: catch a local bus from Tupiza in Bolivia towards the border crossing at Villazon – it takes about an hour. Once you’ve queued and entered Argentina, catch a bus from La Quiacha towards Salta, which takes approx 8 hours (though the route also passes through Humahuaca and San Salvador de JuyJuy).

To/from Chile: lots of the Salt Flats tours will end by dropping you at the Chilean border, as well as arranging your onward bus journey towards San Pedro de Atacama – much easier than heading back to Uyuni first. Once you cross the border, it takes just over an hour to reach Calama and a further two hours to San Pedro de Atacama.

To/from Peru: a bus runs from La Paz to Puno in Peru (4.5 hours), which also stops at Copacabana, Lake Titicaca, on the way. This border crossing actually takes place in a little hut beside the lake – probably one of the most picturesque crossings I’ve ever had!

What visa do I need for Bolivia?

As a UK citizen with a British passport, I was given a 90 day Bolivian visa on arrival at the airport (their usual offering is 30 days but I specified at the time that I wanted the maximum 90 days). However, it’s not as simple for other nationalities. There are 3 groups of countries:

Group 1 – countries whose citizens do not require a visa (i.e. Australia, Britain, Canada, most of Europe)

Group 2 – countries whose citizens must obtain a visa prior to entry for free/upon arrival for a fee (i.e. USA, Iran, China and Taiwan)

Group 3 – countries whose citizens must obtain a visa in advance with special authorisation (i.e. Israel, Pakistan and Indonesia)

However, it’s probably easiest to check Wikipedia for your country’s visa policy for Bolivia, and your country’s embassy pages too.

Where to go in Bolivia?

Explore La Paz, the world’s highest city

There’s something magic about the air in La Paz. Perhaps it’s the altitude (3,640m, which makes it the highest administrative capital in the world); or perhaps it’s the way the pink sunset melts into the mountains each evening.

It’s a city of drama and intrigue, where street parades seem to be a daily occurrence, there’s a constant background noise of honking car horns and eager street vendors, and every new street corner offers up an untold story.

I spent two weeks living in La Paz, studying Spanish in the mornings and volunteering in the afternoons. At first I found the city somewhat obtrusive and the people to be standoffish, but the more I explored the quicker I learned to love it.

What to do in La Paz, Bolivia

Learn the history of coca leaves at the Coca Museum. The coca leaf is everywhere in Bolivia – and not because of cocaine production. Chewing on the leaves alleviates altitude sickness, reduces hunger pangs and keeps people alert, so you’ll often see Bolivian men with a bulge of leaves in their cheek. It’s also a sacred plant used in plenty of Bolivian ceremonies, and the Coca Museum documents the leaf’s role in Bolivian culture.

Rappel down the side of a five-star hotel at Urban Rush. This fifty metre descent takes you from the 17th floor right down to the pavement, either by rappelling or abseiling. It costs 150 Bolivianos ($22USD) and you even get to choose your own superhero outfit!

Ride the ‘Mi Teleferico’ cable car across the city. Like many experiences in La Paz, the ‘Mi Teleferico’ is the world’s highest cable car ride – but it’s also a pretty spectacular one. Stretching from La Paz to El Alto, the cable car has cut commuting time from an hour to just ten minutes, costs just 3 Bolivianos one-way (while a one-way bus ticket is 5 Bolivianos), and offers incredible views of the city and surrounding mountains.

Explore El Alto market. Every Thursday and Sunday, there’s a huge open-air market in the neighbouring city of El Alto. While tourists are discouraged from visiting alone due to pick-pockets, it’s a fascinating place – check out the yatiri fortune tellers in the blue huts beside the bus station!

Read more: Traditions and superstitions at Bolivia’s El Alto market

Watch a cholita wrestling match. There’s a bizarre entertainment on offer in El Alto: watching traditionally dressed cholita women wrestle each other in front of an audience. It’s got all the pantomime qualities of WWE but with bowler hats and frilly skirts – what’s not to love?

Visit the witches market on Calle de las Brujas. This tiny cluster of street stalls is where the superstitious side of Bolivia comes to the fore. You’ll see old women selling stone talismans, love spells and llama foetuses

Climb Huayna Potosi. It takes two to three days to summit the most popular mountain climb in Bolivia – but you’ll need to prepare for using crampons on an ice wall, breathing with oxygen tanks and spending at least one full day training. Once you reach the top at 6,088m, you’ll be rewarded with insane views and a spectacular sunrise. Tours cost between $150-300.

Cycle down ‘The Most Dangerous Road in the World’. The narrow track which winds through the steep Bolivian mountains is known by locals as Yunga Road – but tourists know it better as Death Road. It’s now closed to public traffic, so it’s just the daily mountain bike tours which skitter downhill past sheer hundred-feet drops and around hairpin turns. My fear of heights prevented me from cycling Death Road, but I’ve heard from many sources that Gravity is the most reputable company to go with.

Climb the Chacaltaya glacier. If you ever wanted evidence of global warming in Bolivia, just look to Chacaltaya. It used to be the world’s highest ski run, but so much ice has melted in the last few decades that the glacier has effectively disappeared (see that tiny derelict hut in the photo? It used to be the ski lodge). It’s still possible to summit Chacaltaya mountain: an organised day trip can drive you up to 5,200m, allowing you to climb the last 200m and reach the peak. The air is thin enough up here to notice the effects, but not bad enough to require oxygen.

Book Your La Paz Hostel Here

Read more: the impromptu street parades of La Paz, Bolivia

Settle into the slow life in Sucre

Sucre was the only place in Bolivia where I properly settled down. I was volunteering with Biblioworks each day and had rented an apartment, so I had the luxury of being able to cook in my own kitchen – which also meant buying fresh ingredients at Mercado Central and ‘befriending’ (in my eyes, at least) various ladies at their respective stalls.

It’s hard not to fall in love with Sucre: the city has a slow, ambling pace of life, the weather is gorgeous and it’s filled with plenty of travellers and expats who’ve found it somewhat impossible to leave.

What to do in Sucre, Bolivia

Soak up the lovely weather. Constant blue skies and spring-like temperatures all year round make Sucre the perfect place to chill out – and there’s plenty of cafes and coffee shops to do that in!

Explore Sucre’s General Cemetery. I’d heard stories about this cemetery, but was still totally surprised to discover it felt more like a tranquil park than anything else. Being here for Dia de los Muertes meant seeing how Bolivians celebrate the memory of their loved ones each year by decorating the graves and spending all day there. It’s a beautifully happy way to deal with death, and really eye-opening.

Read more: the most beautiful cemetery in Bolivia

Learn about Bolivia’s cultural background at Museo Nacional de Etnografia y Folklore. There are plenty of museums in Sucre, but this is one of my favourites: filled with costumes and masks from religious ceremonies and festivals.

See ancient dinosaur footprints at Sucre Dinosaur Park. El Parque Cretacico is 40 minutes outside Sucre and features a near-vertical limestone wall which is covered with over 5,000 ancient dinosaur tracks. Millions of years ago this used to be the ocean floor and it’s the largest collection of dinosaur prints in the world! There’s also a small garden with dino sculptures and a museum of dinosaur skeletons.

People-watch in Plaza 25 de Mayo. I spent a lot of time in this plaza because there was always something to see – from protesters, troupes of musicians and children dressed in indigenous clothing to the costumed zebras helping people cross the road!

Plaza 25 de Mayo, Sucre

Where to eat in Sucre

Condor Trekkers Cafe: a firm favourite amongst Sucre backpackers, Condors is part non-profit tour company and part cafe. The latter serves amazing food – the daily set lunch is always tasty, and the tucumana with side salad is particularly excellent.

Churrasqueria Bisonte: this no-frills steak place near the bus station is set in an internal courtyard with plastic tables, but it served the most fantastic steak I’ve ever eaten.

Abis Patio: the barbecue burgers are lovely, and chatting to the incredibly friendly restaurant owner is even better!

Mirador Cafe on Recoleta Plaza: a short walk uphill from the centre of the city is Recoleta Plaza, a lookout point where you can lie back in deckchairs and share a pitcher of fresh lemonade. It’s a great spot to while away the afternoon.

Mercado de Pescados: this local market in a car park serves freshwater fish on the grill at lunchtime. It’s a neighbourly affair – you squish onto a row of tables and eat fish, corn and potato with your hands – and it’s seriously delicious.

Look For Your Sucre Hostel Here

Read more: Eating all the Bolivian food during a month in Sucre

Drink the world’s highest wine in Tarija

Tarija is Bolivia’s wine country. Thanks to the altitude, they produce the highest wine in the world here, and though Tarija tourism isn’t particularly developed yet, the town still feels like a holiday destination – it boasts Mediterranean weather and a tranquil, laid-back attitude to life. Gone are the frenzied traffic jams and political protests of La Paz: Tarija is where locals smile at you when they pass and ladies with palm tree brushes sweep streets free of garbage.

What to do in Tarija, Bolivia

Visit the local vineyards. Bolivian wine producers like Campos de Solano and Casa Real have their wineries in Tarija, and you can either join an official wine tour or plan your own ad-hoc visit with public transport. We opted for the latter but it would’ve been much easier to be part of an organised group tour! Typical prices are between 100-170 Bolivianos.

Wander the parks in Tarija. This is a very laid back city, and once you’ve enjoyed a few bottles of wine it’s even more pleasant to chill out in Plaza de Armas Luis de Fuentes y Vargas, or wander along the Guadalquivir riverbanks.

Look at fossils in the Museo Paleontologico y Arqueologico. Just off Tarija’s main plaza, this little museum has a fantastic collection of dinosaur bones and collected fossils from across Bolivia. Although things seem dusty and cramped, it’s an interesting place to spend an hour or so.

Eat lunch at Casa Vieja. This beautiful restaurant is set in the vineyards of Valle de la Concepcion, a short taxi ride away from Tarija. Casa Veija is famed for their huge plates of roasted pork, fresh from a turning spit in the courtyard – a plateful costs 60 Bolivianos, and a jug of local wine doesn’t cost much more.

Find Your Tarija Hostel Here