I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaaack...

Excelleeeeeeeeeeent...

In haven't been here for quite a while, and now I'm back, but darn, I've got no idea what to write!

Home again

Just came home from Bagac yesterday after a three-day youth camp. Now I'm helping a friend with her project. She needs to interview a WW II survivor, and she chose my paternal grandmother. I'm also trying to contact my best mate's granny, who happens to be German.

Sinornithosaurus millenii: the first venomous dinosaur

The news was out earlier this week.

Crichton's depiction of Dilophosaurus wetherilli and Procompsognathus triassicus may once be considered unorthodox (if not naive), but things seem to have changed: "In Sinornithosaurus fossils, researchers discovered an intriguing pocket, possibly for a venom gland, connected to the base of a fang by a long groove, which likely housed a venom duct, the study says. Sinornithosaurus fangs also feature snakelike grooves in their surfaces."

Much like a cobra's or a boomslang's, huh? David Burnham says S. millenii (which translates to "Chinese bird lizard of the millenium" in English) probably produced a type of neurotoxin that was potent enough to stun birds and other small animals into lethargy at the amount Sinornithosaurus was probably capable of producing.

I couldn't agree more. Now I think at least some other species of dromaeosaurs produced saliva that acted like neurotoxins. The spit would also cause stupor. Honestly, a pack of Utahraptor would find it easier to climb and dispatch a groggy Astrodon than a fully alert one.

WATCH OUT WORLD! DROMAEOSAURS JUST GOT EVEN DEADLIER!!!

Back From Subic

The family is back from a two day stay in Subic. We stayed at Forest View (formerly called Forest Hills if I am not mistaken). We got to watch the macaques (again, but this time in a more natural setting). Turns out, the population in the said area is quite new. The alpha male is rather young, and the members seem a bit inexperienced; one had a missing hand, one lost its leg, and a third had its tail cut short, presumably due to traps. Nonetheless, Daddy and I were able to watch the alpha male assert his dominance by harassing the lower-ranking members of the troop. We also had the chance to see him mate with two females. I was a bit disappointed though with the fact that I only saw one crow near where we stayed.

What happened last Thursday?

Well, you see, we didn't have anything to do at school, so we decided to do some MythBusters stuff. Emer and I started it out by making tiny explosions with a can of Coke, a piece of string, some methyl alcohol, and some matches. Then we got bored, so we took a WHOLE ball of string, basted it tenderly in some methyl alcohol, then set it on fire and played soccer with it. I accidentally extinguished it, so we took a BIGGER ball and set it on fire again. THEN we put that ball in a can. I poured some denatured alcohol over it (we used denatured to play safe). Then BA-BOOM!!! An explosion! I put the bottle too close to the flames and ball of fire rose. I felt my hand getting hot, and I looked to see that the bottle (I was still clutching it) was aflame. I gently put it down and blew the fire dead. We ended the day by taking the bottom halves of a couple of Coke cans, taping them together, pouring in a lot of denatured alcohol (I wanted to use methyl), marinating the string in the same type of alcohol, putting one end of the string in a hole on the can, and lighting the string, much like a bomb. The top (bottom) half of the can flew up with a loud "POP" and hit a tree branch. I'm sure it could've flown 20 feet into the air.

I'm back!!!

I'M BACK!!!!!

Pantherid melanism

I was reading Rudyard Kipling's "The Spring Running" this morning, and I've been thingking of Bagheera, the black panther, ever since. My fancy for pantherids was once again aflame. Thus, I did some research on cases of melanism in the genus Panthera (leo, tigris, onca, and pardus; the lion, tiger, jaguar, and leopard, respectively).
According to what I have read, melanism in the species P. pardus is most profound in the the South East Asian population, where black panthers are more common than normally colored individuals. Also, melanistic leopards are on average smaller and more lightly built than their yellowish counterparts.
Regarding P. onca, I believe the distribution of panthers and normal jaguars is even, though the panther gene is dominant. Unlike the black leopards though, the native South Americans (I don not know if this is factual, however) claim that black specimens are larger and more aggressive. This I can not explain, but the distribution of black and normal individuals (in both onca and pardus) is a simple matter of habitat.
I have every reason to believe that leopards in SE Asia more commonly habituate dense rainforests, where the canopy blocks out most of the sunlight. This is a prime example of evolution taking place due to specific requirements. In such a dark place as that, a black coat is much more preferable than a yellowish one.
The said reason is similar for P. onca, and the even distribution of blacks and normals is probably due to South America's relatively irregular forest pattern.

As for the two remaining species...

I have only read of a single account of a black lion. This was a report of a very big Persian lion that was seen by the archaeologist Sir Henry Layard which was described as being "very dark brown in colour, in parts almost black." There are, of course, no lions at all left in Persia today...much less big black ones. There are two explanations for this specimen's existence: one is melanism. The other is that the darkness of a lion's mane and possible its coat is affected by climate. Lions in Europe are darker than lions in Africa (this is because of Europe's colder climate).
There are, however, leucistic specimens of P. tigrs and P. leo (there are also reports of white jaguars, and white leopards have been discovered, but these are very rare). These individuals, though, are not products of evolution. They are actually random mutants, though their coats might help in their grassy habitat.