Eating Duck, Duck, GOOSE

I was on a roll posting things there and then suddenly poof! I swear I wasn’t just eating bon bons…well, I’m doing that now…but that is beside the point! Life happens, we move on.

Specifically, we move on to ducks.

DUCK

Some cutie wanted to know why it is safe and acceptable to eat duck medium-rare or rare, but not chicken. Why indeed! Honestly, I hadn’t thought about it. Apparently I do not eat enough ducks. Also, Googling this will get you a lot of cooking forums where folks suppose that ducks and geese are bacteria free.

Ducks and geese, like everything else, are exposed to bacteria in their daily lives and thus susceptible to bacterial contamination. The difference between them and chicken is actually in the muscle itself.

Although not as red as beef, duck and goose meat is considered “red”. As migratory birds, they possess fast-oxidative muscle fibers (which I described oh so long ago…). Like beef, these muscles are dense, so bacteria cannot penetrate deep into the tissue. As a result, as long as the outside of the duck or goose is cooked, the inside can safely remain pink. Of course, as the FDA always likes to remind us at the bottom of the menu, “any raw or undercooked meat or eggs carry a risk of food-bourne illness, &etc”. But The Risk is still greatly decreased.

Chicken on the other hand, is a considerably less dense white meat. Bacteria can penetrate deeper into their fast-glycolytic muscle tissue, so cooking chicken all the way through is necessary. If you don’t, that pink center will only get warm enough to incubate whatever could be living in there. And that would be gross.

Don’t be gross.

The End.

Sources

Armentrout, Jennifer. “Cooking Duck Breast: Is Medium-Rare Safe?” Fine Cooking. Feb 9, 2015. <http://www.finecooking.com/articles/cooking-duck-brest-medium-rare.aspx&gt;

Sherwood, Lauralee, Hillar Klandorf and Paul Yancey. 2005. Animal Physiology: From Genes to Organisms. Thomson Brookes/Cole, Belmont, CA.

–. 2015 “Meat and Poultry Temperature Guide.” Food Network. Feb 9. 2015 <http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/articles/meat-and-poultry-temperature-guide.html&gt;

Hyrax, Elephants and Florida

“What unlikely cousins are there in the animal kingdom? (looking at elephants and the hyrax.)”

Didn’t…you just answer that a little…? Hm…Well, I’ll tell you what: there are MILLIONS of “unlikely” relatives in the animal kingdom. Or at least, they LOOK very unlikely, but for a variety of reasons (most of them evolution….all of them evolution), it does make sense that they now seem so different. With regards to the hyrax and the elephant, they are one another’s CLOSEST living relatives. Which means they had other, closer relatives, but they’re all gone now (to Florida, maybe?). To get from the small, furry hyrax to the gigantic, wrinkled elephant, millions of years of divergent evolution occurred. There was an accumulation of different traits between populations of their common ancestor that led to different species. As these different traits were selected for and emphasized with evolution (ex. Animals evolved bigger and bigger or smaller and smaller as it proved advantageous), the descendant species came to look more and more different. Eventually, some species’ traits proved deleterious; they were selected AGAINST and at an increasingly severe disadvantage in terms of survival and reproduction. These species are the elephant/hyrax’s relatives that are currently extinct (or in Florida).

My point is that if you go back far enough, EVERYTHING has some hella unlikely cousins. These cousins seem particularly unlikely when you no longer can see the gradient between X and Y species. Is this a downer? Hell, probably. Am I making evolution less mysterious? God, I hope so. The elephant and hyrax may not look like they belong at the same family reunion, but the fact that they who are SO different remained while the rest of the family kited off to Florida, is damned impressive.

The State of No Return

So I know this is not the answer you’re looking for, but in researching this, I realized a few things: 1) there are several ways to answer that question 2) one of the ways I could answer that would be very hard for me to personally determine 3) I did not know what a hyrax was (apparently, not a type of goat). I could list off things that are closer to one another than to other things that make more sense (which I can still do, cause hey! It’s fun), but again, evolution ruins the party because those “close” relatives are millions of years of evolution, and many closer relatives apart.. I could personally determine which animals’ closest relatives are such and such surprising thing (as with the elephant and hyrax), but that research would take time that I do not have. Conversely, I could look at existing lists (which I will link to), but I’d prefer to be original here. Also, I think I was confusing hyrax with ibex. THESE ARE VERY DIFFERENT THINGS.

You can tell the difference thusly: this bro is cute and twee…

…while you can tell by the eyes that this guy WILL push you off a ledge. That one. That ledge. Avoid that ledge.

And now, a list:

• Shrimp and potato bugs (aka pill bugs, aka sow bugs, aka woodlice, aka the bug I tracked into the apartment yesterday &etc) are more closely related than potato bugs and millipedes or centipedes. That’s because they’re both crustaceans and the blanky-pedes are not (they’re myriapods).
• Cephalopods (squid, octopods, cuttlefish) and snails and slugs and oysters Rockefeller are all Molluscs.
• After decades of debate, scientists have decided that pandas are less like large, greyscale red pandas and more of an “aberrant bear”. A-BEAR-rant, right? Ha ha…ha…
• Hyenas, despite looking like hairy, ‘roided up pit bull/wolf hybrids, are more closely related to cats and have stinking ADORABLE pups.

• Sea pigs are related to sea cucumbers. Sea pigs exist. They exist and just…WHY. THEY ARE GOO WHAT WAS EVOLUTION THINKING.

WHY

Sources

Laidler, Keith. 2009. Animals: A Visual Guide to the Animal Kingdom. Quercus Publishing Plc, London.

Zweifel. 2002. “Hyraxes”. Encyclopedia of Animals. Barnes and Noble Books, New York.

Two separate CRACKED articles about unlikely animal relatives

5 Species You Won’t Believe Are Related

10 Animals You Won’t Believe Are Closely Related

The Urban Wild- Addendum

Five second after hitting “publish” on my last post, I realized I neglected to mention some of the fun parts of wildlife adapting to urban life. Survival favors the smart in urban environments. Animals that do not figure out how to avoid cars become wildlife pancakes. Some go beyond basic survival and into making man’s machines work for them:

THEY FIGURED OUT THE CROSSWALK YOU GUYS. I mean, maybe that’s not so impressive, crows and ravens were already super smart. But I will tell you something else: way back when I worked at Woodland Park Zoo as a teenaged volunteer, I was walking to lunch when I noticed this great blue heron winging over to the North end of the zoo. There were so many people around I was surprised it would hang out here. I kept walking and saw that it had perched itself by the penguin exhibit. What the hell for? But in a few minutes it was obvious: it was Friday, the penguins received live fish every Friday at noon, they would chase the fish around the tank, but inevitably the heron was able to snag a few. This was not a one time deal, that heron was there every Friday, right at noon (or just before) to steal some fish. It not only figured out that, despite the zoo having no wetlands, there were fish somewhere, but also the exact day and time said fish would be available.

Now, if only the danged things could learn to take tickets, then maybe they’d EARN their fish…

The Urban Wild Part 2

Apparently after 87 pages filled with uncommon scientific terms, Microsoft Word just gives up on spell checking. Basically I killed spell check. FUN FAKTS.

Anyway, back to Tuesday’s urban ramble.

Before continuing, I would like to clarify that I am addressing the recolonization of wildlife following human development. That is, how wildlife communities respond as human settlements urbanize (eg. develop into large towns or cities). Why is this an important clarification? Because developing land for settlement rather than for agriculture places different pressures on the local wildlife. For instance, there may be less concrete to cover potential burrow space or fewer people to scare away grazers, but farmers will discourage any potential threat to their livelihood. Farming is a tough business without Bambi’s family eating everything.

Damn adorable jerks.

Now, back to business.

Given my understanding of ecology, I can give a rough idea of how recolonization by wildlife in urban areas works. This is not perfect (you could teach a whole class on this very subject), so bear with me.

Consider urbanization of a habitat like a natural disaster; everything is changed and initially there is nothing but what humans have planted or allowed to remain (grass, trees, flowers, etc). Wild animals are exterminated or driven out to nearby wilderness, where their numbers grow to the point that some species move into human settlements just to find enough food. The order in which species move into urban areas does not follow set rules, but the order in which species successfully adapt does. Raptors, for instance, can fly in to the city all they want, but they won’t succeed unless prey animals recolonize first.

First to succeed are the small animals that can reproduce fast, these feed on/live in the surviving plants. Their size allows them to easily avoid humans (they may not have even been driven out in the first place) and their r-selected reproduction strategy (that is, they reproduce, really rell-I mean well) ensures that a few man-caused deaths do not greatly impact their population. Species that can rebound this quickly are small rodents like rats and mice (rabbits too if there’s spaces to build warrens), as well as many smaller birds that can fly away from disturbance and easily return to smaller urban trees.

Following the wee squinnies, scavengers like raccoons and crows will quickly move in, with the abundance of man-made trash and various rodents to feed on. Coyotes and foxes, being larger and slower to reproduce, do have a harder time. They stick out and come into contact with domestic animals more, so humans actively discourage their settling nearby. Even in rural areas, the presence of coyotes is met with violent opposition. However, they can and do learn to adapt.

As prey populations increase and the habitat stabilizes, predators can move in. However, urban environments severely limit the species that are able to colonize. Without large prey or any inclination to be near humans, large predators stay away from cities. As a result, the most common predators in urban areas are birds of prey. A variety of sizes, many species can coexist in a city, feeding on a variety of small birds and rodents. Besides any larger trees remaining, raptors can nest on building ledges and around support systems for bridges, overpasses and other raised structures.

That covers a general overview of wildlife recolonization. Something to keep in mind though, is that despite nature’s amazing ability to bounce back, urban environments are made to support humans, not wildlife and thus do not favor biodiversity. From the different categories I mentioned (small animals, scavengers, predators), it is a MUCH more limited number of species that will recolonize than that originally lived in a given habitat. I mean, the sheer amount of concrete in even a small city is enough to increase local temperature. Many species require some very specific conditions in order to live and reproduce.

So beyond “PEOPLE ARE BAD AND YOU SHOULD FEEL BAD”, what am I getting at? DO SOMETHING. In a broad sense, support local, national and international conservation efforts. In a more personal sense, try to make your habitat a habitat for other species; plant some trees, build a bat box, set up an owl house, etc. See what species are hurting in your area, and how you can help. Maybe start a science blog and guilt trip strangers and friends into supporting conservation!

One of the most important things is, if you have a conflict with animals, try to find an eco-friendly solution. Pests like mice and rats may be far from even hearing of the endangered species list, but plenty of raptors that depend on them aren’t. Choosing to poison household pests means you could also be poisoning local wildlife that think they’ve scored a weak and easy meal. Options like sonic repellants and snap traps can keep EVERYONE happy without impacting the rest of the food chain.

For bothersome and/or scary animals that are not an immediate threat, choose avoidance first. For instance, if you choose to attack a rattlesnake rather than back away, 1. you’re ignoring its very helpful suggestion to GO AWAY AND WE’LL ALL BE HAPPY and 2. you’re prolonging contact, which means you’re more likely to get bitten then if you’d just left it alone. Remember: people are big and scary, animals do not react kindly when scared, so just walk away.

For immediate threats, well…I’ll leave y’all to assess the situation, but generally running and screaming is a bad idea.

Resources for those interested:

Humane Rodent Solutions

Create A Certified Wildlife Habitat

Barnowlboxes.com (They sell, you guessed it! Barn owl and bat boxes and make the important point that both provide natural pest control)

The Return! / The Urban Wild Part 1

GOLLY it’s been a while hasn’t it?? So now that it’s been almost a year since I began my “little” hiatus it is high time I got back into the saddle. I’d apologize for the length of said hiatus, but I had three jobs and wasn’t sleeping well for a good chunk of it so I APOLOGIZE TO NO ONE. I’ve actually been on just two jobs for a little while, now, but only recently started thinking to myself that I needed something to suck up more of my time. No really, I sit in my room and stare at the pictures of jellyfish on the wall and wonder what to do with the free time I actually have.

I have a problem.

But my problem means fun stuff for those few interwebbers out there still interested in what I have to say! Yaaaay!…?

I’d like to pick up right where I left off, answering some questions/addressing topics brought up in my little informal Facebook survey.

“How do animals adapt to urban areas, Are humans part of the biosphere? (if so what should our role be in conservation)”

Although I can quickly and easily answer this with a resounding YES, this is an excellent question that merits a longer response. Too often humans consider themselves separate from nature; we and our cities and town are outside the “natural world” even though we built our cities right in the “natural world”. Growing up, I would have not considered going to the tidepools on the beach near my house “getting out in nature”. I could see Taco Time from there, no way that’s “nature”. Do these things somehow, in their proximity from humanity, become domestic? No, it just indicates how separate most people feel from “real” nature.

Why is this? When you think about it, there is quite a few species that have found ways to thrive around humans. Squirrels, songbirds and rodents thrive in urban environments. Omnivores like raccoons, foxes and coyotes are also doing well. Others have niches that are in direct conflict with human development. Larger shore birds (herons, cranes), amphibians and sea turtles (to name just a few) are seriously impacted when people start developing around their homes. In the cases of the birds and amphibians, proximity and/or building right on top of their habitat drives them out, while sea turtles experience lower fertility because ocean-front high rises make beaches too cool for their sand-buried nests. Finally there are some species that humans just do not like, either due to real or imagined impact on themselves or their livestock. Wolves are making a comeback after being hunted to local extinction (exterminated from a given area) because of the danger they posed to livestock. While reptiles such as snakes and crocodilians excite an unreasonable amount of fear, to the point that some areas of the US host “Rattlesnake Round Ups” in an effort to exterminate an animal that is more danger to the vermin around their trash than to them.

Seriously, why be afraid of snakes? They have the WORST aim.

Getting into how animals adapt to life in the big city (beyond the basics, like learning the bus schedule, finding the best cafes, etc), knowing the species of animal in question is as important as knowing how a particular population adapts. Different species have different lifestyles better suited toward adapting to urban environments. I will get into more detail on this in my next post.

Happy Mustelid-day

First, I would like to say that I am in the process of moving and filling out various and sundry paperwork.

Second, the process of filling out various and sundry paperwork FILLS ME WITH RAGE. RAGE that only the Mustelidae family can calm. But honestly though, if you want a thing turned in for verification on one day and that’s four weeks before the listed deadline, WHY WOULDN’T YOU MAKE THOSE DATES THE SAME.

Ahem, anyway…Mustelidae!

Mustelidae include martens, skunks, otters, wolverines, badgers, and other more or less weasel-y things. They’re a carnivorous family and regardless of the fame of other carnivores like canids and big cats, boast twice the species of any other family of carnivores. Cute AND numerous. Except for wolverines, those are CRANKY. More impressively though, is the fact that mustelids are flipping EVERYWHERE. Land, sea air, you name it! Except for air, that was a lie. But forests, lakes, desert, burrowing, swimming, arboreal, anywhere and on anything unless that something is Antarctica or Australia. Weasel No-Man’s Land right there. Doesn’t mean they’re any easier to find (the tricky bastards), but you at least know that anywhere else, there are Mustelida somewhere.

Since UNDYING RAGE and my need for sustenance call me now, over the next couple days I will cover some very important and/or famous mustelids: black-footed ferrets and sea otters.

Source

Cogger, Harold G., Joseph Forshaw, Edwin Gould, George McKay and Richard G. Zweifel. 2002. “Marsupials”. Encyclopedia of Animals. Barnes and Noble Books, New York.

Photo Credit: M. Lockhart/USFWS

Snap To It

I would like to introduce you all to Bruno.

Bruno.

Bruno is an alligator snapping turtle. They are mostly aquatic (only females come to land for egg-laying) and live in the Southeastern US. The name comes from their thick, shield-like scales that resemble those on alligators. Bull shit. I think it’s cause those jaws COULD SNAP A GATOR IN HALF. Bruno could, anyway. But that’s just my opinion.

Better view of the gator scales on the tail and shell.

 

A small gator would actually make a nice meal for an alligator snapping turtle. They are carnivores and if you look inside Bruno’s mouth, you might see a little nubbin on his tongue. With increased blood flow, the nubbin expands and turns pink like a little worm, the turtle can then wiggle it around and attract prey straight into their mouth. Anything too big to fit gets torn apart into more manageable, bite-sized chunks. The turtles can hold very still for this, but will also hide in old catfish holes for extra camouflage. You’d think they could turtle up inside their shell to look like a rock, but their heads are so damn huge they won’t fit. The legs also don’t withdraw at all, so there’s that. Fun fact: there is a style of catfish fishing called noodling wherein the noodlers stick their hands into catfish holes for the toothless fish to bite onto, only to be yanked out and fried for dinner. Do you see where I’m going here? There are a lot of noodlers missing fingers out there. If Bruno is any indication, there are probably a couple lacking hands, too (hint: he is, average adult size range is 15.5-30.1 inches). Moral of the story: don’t put your hands or feet anywhere that you can’t see into. Also be glad there are too many Bruno-sized turtles out there. But he’s 250 lbs and well over 150 years old, so that’s not terribly likely. There are many more that are closer to this size out there:

Mini Bruno (most likely not his real name)

Both Bruno and Mini Bruno can be visited at the Wildlife Discovery Center in Lake Forest, Illinois (just outside Chicago, for you outsiders). I visited a couple years ago and loved it. Lots of herps with some raptors and a bobcat tossed in for good measure. They do quite a bit of rescue work and have obtained some of their animals in that way, Bruno included. Bruno had lived in a rusted-out tub that barely fit his shell (let alone his head and legs) for around 20 years before Rob Carmichael (curator of the Wildlife Discovery Center and turtle-holder in both photos) rescued Bruno and cleaned him up. No small feat considering Bruno was covered in a stubborn layer of rust and alligator snapping turtles are not exactly known for their sweet and gentle nature. But clean him up they did and now Bruno is happy as a large, gator-like clam, swimming around his tank at the WDC. Y’all should totally visit and say “hi”. Just don’t try to shake hands. That won’t go over well.

 

Source

Cogger, Harold G., Joseph Forshaw, Edwin Gould, George McKay and Richard G. Zweifel. 2002. “Turtles and Tortoises”. Encyclopedia of Animals. Barnes and Noble Books, New York.

Jackson, Tom. 2010. “Alligator snapping turtle”. Illustrated Encyclopedia of Animals of the World. Metro Books, New York.

Photo credit, me. Animal credit, Rob Carmichael and the Wildlife Discovery Center.

Red-Tailed Beauty

I keep looking for a reason to post a picture of this snake, but none have come up so here it is. This is a red-tailed boa.
Enjoy.