Cats
grrlscientist | March 5, 2008tags: Talking Cat, streaming video
This kitty has a lot to say, don't you think? But what is this cat talking about? The owner's translation; "Hello, Hello, Hello, I Know Hello, Hello Hello Hello. Hello. I'm Alone, I'm on my own, I'm Alone, I know hello." [0:26]
More about the cat, Tiggy.
My cat can say hello, she only does it when shes looking for you though once you call her or she sees you she'll stop so I had to set the camera up and leave it for awhile until she did it. She does this at least 10 times a day shes does it in the morning when she wants us to get up, in the night when shes…
laelaps | March 5, 2008
In the above photograph a female Amur tiger (Panthera tigris altaica) named Taurus displays a flehmen response; she was sniffing the scat of another tiger in the enclosure and repeatedly made this face. As silly as it looks, this type of grimace helps pheromones and other natural chemicals come in contact with the vomeronasal (or Jacobson's) organ, and it allows animals like tigers to ascertain whether another animal is in estrus, what their physical condition is, how long ago they passed by, etc.
Unfortunately I was unable to get a good shot of the display; the little branch in front of the…
laelaps | March 4, 2008
The Bronx Zoo snow leopards (Panthera uncia) have typically been awake during my visits, but the female pictured above was acting like one of my domestic cats on catnip. Unfortunately I wasn't prepared for what she was going to do so she came out as a bit of a blur, but it was impressive to see a big cat jump around the enclosure with such agility and speed. The big paws and long tail of these cats help them keep their footing and balance, and as anyone who saw the snow leopard sequence on Planet Earth knows their skills are even more impressive in their natural, craggy habitat.
laelaps | March 1, 2008
I got a lot of great shots today at the Bronx Zoo (including, believe it or not, a gibbon grooming a tapir), and although I plan on spacing them out over the next few weeks I thought I would put up one right away. This is one of the snow leopard (Panthera uncia) twins born at the zoo, now a bit grown up, and she just woke up from a nap she was taking with her sister and her mother on a large rock. It looks like the zoo is trying to breed another pair of these big cats, too, so more likely than not there will be more snow leopard cubs born there in the near future.
laelaps | February 28, 2008
Large zoos have a number of different methods for presenting animals (large carnivores, especially) to the public, but the "pit" set-up is perhaps my least favorite. The lion (Panthera leo) exhibit at the National Zoo, for instance, is a a huge, deep pit with several tiers on it, the edge of the island being separated from the pit wall by a moat. The lions can't get out, but there isn't much preventing anyone from falling in, an event that isn't likely to occur but will definitely be dangerous if it does. Likewise, the pits put the animals further away from visitors than could be achieved in…
laelaps | February 25, 2008
Most of the Amur tiger (Panthera tigris altaica) photos I post here are of an older female named Zeff at the Bronx zoo, but during my earlier visits I often saw another of the several individuals rotated through the public viewing enclosures. The tiger pictured above is named Sasha, a relatively young male that has usually been out for viewing during my visits. It can be somewhat difficult to tell individuals apart, but as I've said before each tiger has their own unique stripe pattern, and even the marks on the side of their faces can be useful in telling one animal from another.
laelaps | February 22, 2008
Unfortunately I don't have any photographs of charismatic carnivores in the snow, but here's another shot of Zeff the Amur Tiger (Panthera tigris altaica) on a cold February morning. I could probably get some today or tomorrow, but being that the snow is still coming down it's probably safer not to try and make it over the George Washington Bridge today.
laelaps | February 21, 2008
Two members of the three-cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) coalition at the Philadelphia Zoo.
laelaps | February 18, 2008
A snow leopard (Panthera uncia) cub snacking on a bit of bone at the Bronx Zoo.
laelaps | February 11, 2008
Right now it's about 10 degrees Fahrenheit here in New Jersey, and the last time I remember it being this cold was on a day last year when I decided to visit the Bronx Zoo. Being that it was so cold there weren't many people around at 10 AM, but the Amur tigers (Panthera tigris altaica) were up and active. The female pictured above was named Zeff (she was about 13 years old when I took the photo), and it seemed that I caught her attention for a moment or two. It's a bit disconcerting to have a tiger staring at you while she scratches her claws on a log, but as cold as it was I would much…
laelaps | February 8, 2008
Over the past few years I've made a number of trips to the Bronx Zoo to photograph the animals there, and if I didn't know better I would swear that the melanistic leopards (Panthera pardus) in the"Jungle World" exhibit are statues. They're always asleep and I've never seen one so much as twitch, but then again, they're cats. When I first saw them I thought that they were melanistic jaguars (Panthera onca), but the faintly visible spot patterns and their more gracile features (especially the head) proved them to be leopards.
laelaps | February 5, 2008
One member of a three-cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) coalition at the Philadelphia Zoo.
laelaps | February 1, 2008
Smilodon is perhaps the most famous of all the saber-toothed cats, but the level of notoriety it has received has led to a number of misunderstandings. As a child I remember hearing in a documentary (complete with somewhat hokey stop-motion giant sloths) that sabercats became extinct because their teeth grew so long that they could not close their mouths. I did not know it at the time, but this fallacious idea had been around for quite some time, and was quite surprised to find an effective refutation of it when I read G.G. Simpson's popular book The Meaning of Evolution (1950);
The…
laelaps | January 15, 2008
This is Leo, a snow leopard (Panthera uncia) at the Bronx zoo that was taken in by the zoo recently. Leo was orphaned at a very young age, too young to fend for himself in the wild, and with cooperation from officials in Pakistan was transferred to the Bronx zoo for care. The zoo has so much success with snow leopards that a new snow leopard habitat is being constructed at the Central Park zoo, set to open in the spring of 2009.
laelaps | January 14, 2008While my post about feral cats from last week might be a bit controversial to some, the LAPD is getting some help from from feral cats with a rat problem. According to the Los Angeles Times, there are a number of places in LA with rat and mice problems, and an animal rescue group has placed a number of feral cats at police stations with rat/mice infestations in order to help solve the problem. The cats don't catch and kill the mice and rats as much as drive them out of the area, it seems, but it still presents a benefit to both the cats (which might have otherwise been destroyed) and the…
laelaps | January 12, 2008
One of the snow leopard (Panthera uncia) cubs from the Bronx zoo hops over her sister. I haven't been back to the zoo since May of this past year so I have no idea if they are still there, but they are assuredly much bigger now than when I took this photograph.
laelaps | January 11, 2008
Most of the photographs of Amur tigers (Panthera tigris altaica) I post here are of an older female named Zeff at the Bronx zoo, but this tiger (also a resident at the Bronx zoo) is a younger male named Sasha. The two can be told apart from each other (as well as any other tiger) because each tiger has a unique stripe pattern, allowing for fairly easy identification of individuals.
laelaps | January 10, 2008
This shot, taken at the Bronx zoo, is of one of the snow leopard (Panthera uncia) twins and her mother. The photograph was a bit difficult to get as I was shooting through a glass barrier and the shadows were very strong, but I still think it came out pretty well. Like "true" leopards (Panthera pardus), the young stay with their mother until they are old enough to hunt on their own (although they usually remain past when they are proficient at hunting for a time, approaching sexual maturity being a likely marker for separation between mother and cubs).
laelaps | January 2, 2008In the latest issue of the Journal of Mammalogy, a resolution by the American Society of Mammalogists was published (resulting from the 87th annual conference held in June 2007) calling upon the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to get off its butt and do something about jaguar (Panthera onca) conservation in the United States. When I think of jaguar habitat the forests of South and Central America first come to mind, but jaguars have historically been found in the southwestern U.S., and even though the indigenous population was wiped out in the last century new individuals keep coming in from…
laelaps | December 29, 2007
The Snow Leopard (Panthera uncia) is one of the most most endangered big cats, and while there are many laws and programs that seek to protect the animals poaching is still a problem. Earlier this year NPR featured a short report on this problem, but it's not only scientists that are concerned about the disappearance of these cats and other animals. Photographers and a growing number of wildlife sound technicians are also heading out into the the places where rare species are still hanging on, and yesterday NPR featured another report featuring big cat conservation expert Alan Rabinowitz,…