The question remains: do cats really have the ’sixth sense’? Cats have demonstrated the ability to sense death, arrival of a loved one, natural disasters, and paranormal activities. They even have the ability to find their way back home from long distances and places they are unfamiliar with.
All these could be attributed to what is known as the ‘anpsi’ – a part of the paranormal realm which allows them to display this ’sixth sense’.
It is interesting to note that minute things like the sensitivity of the cat’s feet and the vibration of its whiskers may be a forewarning for big events like earthquakes. These things could be attributed to their in-built magnetic sensitivity and / or internal clock which allows them to know when to anticipate someone’s arrival or to have exceptional navigational powers.
While these things might be explained using modern science, there is undoubtedly some room for debate as one wonders if cats really do possess the intelligence to find their way back home from unknown places, or whether they have the ‘extra sense’ to see paranormal activities that even human beings are unable to see. Who’s to decide, anyway?
IS sex always a good thing? Unfortunately Male Praying Mantis says NO. This is because Female Praying Mantis consume the head (and sometimes the rest) of her mate during copulation. Yes i know what you are thinking. Even nymphomaniacs squirm at this thought.
Praying Mantis have a carnivorous appetite that include moths, crickets, flies, grasshoppers and other insects as well. These insects are also prone to eating others of their own kind. The most famous example of this is the notorious mating behavior of the adult female, who sometimes eats her mate just after-sometimes during- mating.
Yet this does stop the males from courtship and mating. The most common courtship of the males would be when he approaches the female frontally, slowing his speed as he nears. The second most common courtship is when the male approaches the female from behind, speeding up as he nears.
But research has challenged this notion of sexual cannibalism among the praying mantis. Eckehard Liske and W. Jackson Davis made videotapes of sex lives of 30 pairs of praying mantises. They discovered that the none of the 30 male mantises had their heads eaten during the mating process. Although female mantises sometimes ate their mates, the deadly act by no means occurred in every case. They observed that the behavior is influenced by captivity: Female mantises became unusually became aggressive thanks to the unusual laboratory conditions and feeding times observed by the researchers.
Yes, the female praying mantis does sometimes eat the male. In fact, it is the male mantises who actually want to offer themselves as food. There is a simple, yet, rational explanation behind it. That is, there is no point in having sex if she is going to die of starvation before she can lay eggs and pass the father’s genes onto the next generation. Some might call this True love.
Now, Guys, how far are you willing to go to sacrifice your lives for true love?
Reference:
“The Female Praying Mantis: Sexual Predator or Misunderstood” by Doughty Michele, Biology 103, 2002 First Paper, http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/1801
Praying Mantis by National Geographic http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/bugs/praying-mantis.html
Liske, E.; Davis, W.J.(1984) Sexual behaviour of the Chinese praying mantis v. 32(3): 916-918
A study done on guppies from the Trinidad River, by Dr. Croft, suggests that the female guppies were being sexually harassed by the males, which has thus caused the females to traverse the waters of the predator to dodge this harassment. Observation indicates that the harassment stems from the male that were rejected by the females.[1] Such an observation ought to be read via the perspective of sexual selection. In an attempt to produce strong offspring, sexual selection occurs where the females only mate with the colourful males, where bright colours are an indication of the males’ attractiveness and high quality.[2] Such acts of sexual selection have thus resulted in the rejected male guppies attempting, “…to sneak a mating with his chosen female when she is not looking.”[3] This has therefore led to the female guppies’ presence in the waters filled with predators, which would keep the harassing males away as their bright colours will make them an easy prey for the predators.
The lens of sexual segregation ought to be employed to read deeper into such behaviours among the female guppies. “Sexual segregation has been defined traditionally as the differential use of space (and often habitat and forage) by sexes outside the mating season”[4] Given this definitional framework, it is now possible to advance a hypothesis to explain the female guppies’ behaviour. Terry Bowyer advanced one that attributed sexual segregation to the need by females to competitively exclude the males.[5] However, this hypothesis may be location-specific and may not hold true for the guppies from regions outside the Trinidad River.
This therefore calls for an alternative hypothesis, which can encompass all female guppies by accounting for such behaviours among them. The alternative hypothesis suggests that the female guppies are not reliant on some seasons as they produce relatively few eggs and give birth to live offspring.[6] This implies that the females’ ultimate aim is to ensure that they produce strong offspring (which occurs from mating with high quality males). This aim is further reinforced by the fact that they live in the waters infested with predators to prevent sexual harassment and unwanted mating, even with the high quality males, given their non-reliant seasons.
As much as the females may aim to produce strong offspring, the ecosystems are such that the predators are the first to go extinct. [7] Thus, while the females may have gone to the waters of the predators to fend the sexual harassment of the male, the realities of the ecosystem may not favour their presence in the predators’ waters. As such, mating may occur inevitably in the predators’ water with less colourful males as they are not as prominent as the brighter coloured ones, which run higher risks of predation in the predators’ waters. Hence, sexual selection (choosing of high quality males) may not occur and this would result in weaker offspring. The possibility of producing weaker offspring can be further vindicated by the studies done in the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, which concluded that female guppies are less choosy when predators are present.[8]
Hence, sexual segregation by female guppies in the form of their residence in the waters of the predators to fend sexual harassment from the rejected males and preclude unwanted mating during their non-reliant period, which is aimed at ensuring the production of high quality offspring, is not favoured by the ecosystem. Given the ecosystem and their limited choice when predators are present, sexual selection among the guppies becomes constrained and thus leads to the production of weaker guppies. Hence, the initial purpose of sexual segregation by traversing the waters of the predators is defeated by the reality of the waters of the predators itself. Despite sexual segregation, the female guppies still get harassed by the males and the quality of their offspring witnesses a plausible degradation.
[1]Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) (2008, August 11). Female Guppies Risk Death To Avoid Sexual Harassment. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 14, 2009, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2008/08/080806154758.htm
[4] R. Terry Bowyer. Sexual Segregation in Ruminants: Definitions, Hypotheses, and Implications for Conservation and Management. RedOrbit. Retrieved April 14, 2009, from http://www.redorbit.com/news/display?id=117355
[6]Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) (2008, August 11). Female Guppies Risk Death To Avoid Sexual Harassment. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 14, 2009, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2008/08/080806154758.htm
[7]University of Chicago Press Journals (2006, May 12). Female Guppies Risk Their Lives To Avoid Too Much Male Attention. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 14, 2009, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2006/05/060512204529.htm
[8]Savannah River Ecology Laboratory (2000, March 20). Mate Selection And Age: What Females Really Want. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 14, 2009, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2000/03/000320085829.htm
Before you catch your favourite mutant slashing his way on the big screen in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, check out the origins of where the character even got his name. Presenting…the REAL Wolverine.
The wolverine (gulo gulo) is the largest land-dwelling member of the Mustelidae or weasel family. It typically lives in the cold, northern parts of the world, especially timbered areas.
It looks like a small bear, with a length of 65-90cm including its 13-26cm tail, a shoulder height of 36-45cm and weight of 9-30kg. The wolverine has short legs and a thick black-brown coat with a light brown stripe extending from each side of the neck along the body to the base of the tail. The wolverine marks its territory using its foul-smelling urine and musk which has earned it the nickname of ‘skunk bear’. Like the bear, the wolverine has poor eyesight, although its hearing and sense of smell are very good.
So why or how is such a puny, even cute little thing such a force to be reckoned with?
Even without the adamantium-laced claws like our Marvel hero, the wolverine still packs a mean punch…well, bite really. The wolverine has a special upper molar in the back of its mouth that is rotated 90 degress toward the inside of the mouth. This structure allows the wolverine to tear meat off from prey that has been frozen solid and to crush bones, enabling the process of extracting marrow.Take a look at the molar structure here.
Along with its sharp teeth, the wolverine is equipped with long and sharp semiretractile (not so original anymore eh?) claws used for fighting and also for climbing trees or logs.
The wolverine is renown for its strength, cunning, fearlessness, and ravenousness. It is a solitary, nocturnal hunter, preying on all manner of game. While smaller sized prey like rodents and rabbits is easy fare for the wolverine, should the opportunity present itself, it will hunt down animals that are much larger in size such as sheep, deer, or small bears. To attack prey that may be faster than itself, the wolverine will climb to the top of a rock or a tall stump. When a deer of some other medium to large animal comes along unawares, the wolverine will jump squarely on the unfortunate animal’s back, breaking or severing vital organs.
Indeed, the wolverine has the ability of defending its food from cougars, grizzly bears and wolf packs (as we just saw). The wolverine is the strongest mammal, relative to its size.
Yet the wolverine is largely an opportunistic feeder, feasting on animals which have been killed by other predatory animals, like caribou, deer, and elk.
Basically solitary, the wolverine requires a lot of space to roam, and have been known to journey 24 kilometers, or 15 miles, a day looking for food. Because of their requirement for large ranges of habitat, wolverines can be found in the remote regions of the tundra, taiga, and boreal forests in the northern parts of North America, Asia, and Europe. In fact, they have a penchant for areas that are uninhabited by humans.
For more information and interesting facts about the wolverine, get over here!
So now you know the lean mean killing machine which is the wolverine. And you know where the fiercest comic book character got his attributes and attitude from – the fiercest creature on earth. SNIKT!
Nora, an adopted grey tabby, has won fame for playing the piano. This rare behavior was apparently self-taught or innate, when she climbed on top of a Yamaha Disklavier piano in the middle of the night and began to play. The couple who adopted Nora owns an art and music studio, where students play the piano in the day. The owners of Nora observed that she has a preference to play on the Yamaha Disklavier piano, even though there are other pianos in their studio. She also includes black keys in her music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ860P4iTaM), and plays duets with the students (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0zgQAp7EYw).
From both videos, it does seem like Nora is musically inclined and not just “fooling around” with the piano. Is her sense of music innate or is there some other reason for her bahavior? A 2001 National Geographic article “Do Animals Have an Innate Sense of Music” suggeststhat animals, including birds and mammals like whales use many musical concepts, such as rhythm, phrase lengths and song structure in their communication. This may help to explain Nora’s sense of rhythm when playing the piano.
However, a piano is an unnatural musical instrument for an animal. Although the owners claim that Nora is self-taught, one might think it’s more probable that Nora might have went through “observational learning”, where the owners taught students to play the piano in the day when Nora was around. Since Nora was also described as being attention loving, the huge amount of attention thrown onto her following her piano-playing incident might have served as a positive reinforcement for her to do it again.
While the rare behavior of Nora has yet been explained satisfactorily, it is most reasonable to suspect that an interplay of the cat’s innate musical abilities and subsequent learning through observation can account for the phenomenon.
