Strollerderby : baby animals

Babies for Your Babies

Shannon LC Cate — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 15:00:00 GMT

It's March here in Chicago and the snow is falling. If you're in New York, you know what I mean. Here we had a glimpse of spring last week, but now suddenly it's winter again and we're stuck inside once more.

Maybe it's too cold and snowy for a trip to the zoo, but call your kids and snuggle up by the nice computer and enjoy these babies from zoos all over the world. Even if you're in Florida you will want to join us. The Boston Globe has assembled a slideshow that will make you pass out from the cute.

See below for a sneak preview and a link!

This little giraffe had trouble getting a latch and its mom had trouble producing milk. So bottled goat's milk it is! For more adorable babes see the Boston Globe.

Baby Moose Falls Through Window into Family Home

Shannon LC Cate — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 20:01:00 GMT

A baby moose foraging for something to eat near the foundation of a Spokane house slipped into the well of a basement window. When the calf tried to struggle its way out of the trap, it kicked through the window and tumbled right into a bedroom.

Thankfully, there was not a baby sleeping below the window!

The baby moose, weighing 375 pounds was shot with a tranquilizer gun, hauled up the narrow basement staircase and reunited with its mother and sibling. Later the whole moose family was trucked to a wilder location and let go.

No word on whether or not homeowner's insurance paid for a replacement window.

Last spring a family of sparrows nested in one of my window sills and a family of squirrels in the other. I've had a stray bird fly into my living room and when I lived in the West Indies, bats were regulars in the evening when the moths gathered around our ceiling lights. But a moose? What's the weirdest--or wildest--animal that ever found its way into your home?

For more on animals finding themselves where they should not be, see: Three-Year Old Attacked by 300 lb Snake

image: thecoxhouse.info

Mother Elephant Accidentally Poops on Her Baby

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:30:00 GMT

However much you may think you screwed up your kids today, you probably didn’t poop on them.

Photographer Brigitte Marcon unwittingly captured this, er, poignant parenting scene as she snapped photos of a mother elephant walking with her babies in the Etosha National Park in Namibia.

The good news is, the baby elephant kept right on walking alongside her mama, seemingly unfazed by her smelly crown. So if a well-intentioned mother can poop on her baby without causing severe trauma, you can rest assured that your children will recover from whatever damage you involuntarily, uh, load on them as well.

Photo: Daily Mail

Morning News: Rare Baby Gorilla Born in D.C.

Shannon LC Cate — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 14:33:00 GMT

Upstaging the President-Elect and his little inauguration is an as-yet unnamed, as-yet, unsexed baby gorilla. Born to experienced mother, Mandara, the baby is a welcome arrival to a population of animals considered critically endangered. You know what I found odd about this story, though? Apparently, the zookeepers usually feed Mandara birth control pills. I can see that you wouldn't want babies born too close together, but her next one up is seven. Odd to me that they would use birth control for an endangered animal. But what do I know? Maybe gorillas nurse until they're six. Anyone out there a primatologist? More photos and a link to a video of mother and baby after the cut.

For that matter anyone out there a conflict-free doctor? It seems those are so few and far between that the FDA can't be bothered to sort them out when it comes to drug trials. Almost half of doctors participating in drug trials don't fill out paperwork indicating their conflicts of interest--their investments, for example, in the companies whose products they are supposed to be testing--and as for the doctors who do fill out the paperwork, the folks responsible for collecting the data don't bother to read about said conflicts.

That doesn't reassure me one bit about ethical quandries like the increasing "hope" for a prenatal autism screen. According to researchers, mothers who bear children later diagnosed with spectrum disorders tend to have higher than normal amounts of testosterone in their amniotic fluid. This leads them to think a screen for such disorders could be around the corner, as might in-utero treatment. If it's a matter of testosterone causing spectrum disorders, they might just block the hormone. Of course this is all completely dodgy guesswork at the moment. And autism advocates are concerned that selective pregnancy terminations could wipe out autism and its cousin, the autistic savant, which, as those of us who admire Albert Einstein can agree, can be pretty darned useful. As can folks with lesser gifts than Einstein's. Dare I say I'd rather have autism in the word than not have it, if it means I get to have the various autistic people in my life whom I love and enjoy--and who bring the human population a unique perspective on the meaning of our existence. Of course, the screen wouldn't only lead to terminations. And I'm sure parents of children with spectrum disorders would have been glad to have more knowledge, earlier on, so they could prepare the proper treatment and therapy for their children. And therein lies the ethical quandry.

Finally, as promised, Here's more of that baby gorilla. And here's the page with the video.Is it just me, or is this whole baby gorilla thing really awesome? I don't know about you, but I needed a bit of happy news.

images: washingtonpost.com and nationalzoo.si.edu

Rare Baby Rhinos Found

Brett Singer — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 17:00:00 GMT

If this doesn't prove that all babies, human or animal, are cute, I don't know what does.

Agus Primabudi of the Ujung Kulon National Park in West Java, Indonesia told reporters that scientists found "Four Javan rhinos of six to seven months" on the beach while doing field research. The Javan rhino is the rarest rhino species of all.

Mostly I'm posting this because the pictures are kind of cute, if a bit grainy. But I also like to think that perhaps this means that there are species out there that we thought were extinct but really aren't. It's a big world, after all, no matter what Disney says.

Plus this post you can show to your kids, unlike the EVIL LEGO SANTA CRAB.

Source: Yahoo News

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Toddler Befriends an Orphaned Baby Orangutan

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 20:20:00 GMT

This is one of those things that's so cute it verges on obnoxious. A one-year-old orangutan named Rishi, born at an animal sanctuary, was rejected by all of the males in his group. So the little guy was sent to The Institute of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species (TIGERS) in Miami, Florida.

When photographer Barry Bland went to take photos of Rishi in his new home, he brought along his two-year-old daughter, Emily. As you can tell from these photos, Rishi and Emily became fast friends, which actually makes a lot of sense when you think about it: they both communicate largely with their hands, they have the same interests (playing, eating, napping), and they are both the most winsome members of their respective species.

Photos: CFP

Elephant Cares for Injured Dog

World's Cutest Monkey Rejected by His Mom

JeanneSager — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 18:04:00 GMT

We might count monkeys among our relatives (shhh, don't tell Sarah Palin), but I'm happy to say most of us wouldn't do what a marmoset mom of triplets did to the cutest thing I've seen since my kid wrapped her arms around her best friend and puckered up.

The marmoset at a British safari park gave birth to a rare set of triplets, but with two teets and three babies, she did the math. Her decision? Bye bye little monkey. Fortunately for little John Wayne (because he's a quiet man? I don't know - he's definitely no challenge to the Duke in stature), the park photographer has stepped in to play foster mom.

John Wayne is barely the size of photographer Penny Boyd's thumb, and she has to feed him with a syringe at two-hour intervals throughout the day and night. Apparently newborn marmosets don't sleep through the night either (an inherited trait?). This is actually the second baby monkey Boyd has had to adopt since marmosets were introduced at the tourist destination. Elliott is older, but not much bigger - marmosets are the world's smallest primates.

She says John Wayne will make an excellent little brother for Elliott to play with. Let's just hope he doesn't get too cheeky.

Image/Source: Telegraph

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Look! Over Here! Baby Animals!

Amy Kuras — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 23:02:00 GMT

Grrr. Sigh. Grrrr. I am well in the throes of Palin rage. Cannot deal with her and her g-dropping folksiness. Any. Longer. Crabby. Very, very crabby.

So! Baby animals! Look! The Virginia Zoo in Norfolk has had a baby boom of sorts, with ten different babies born in the last couple of months. Four snakes, a couple armadillos, some turtles and a baby bongo, which I did not know exsisted before I saw this story in my Google Alerts (it’s a type of antelope). That's her over there. Kind of pretty, huh? her name is Eva.

Many of the animals that were born at the zoo are endangered. The bongos, for example, are nearly extinct in their native Africa and earlier babies were sent to a breeding program in Mount Kenya in an attempt to repopulate the animals.

The zoo’s also raising two six-banded armadillo babies, the first ones to survive beyond a month in any US zoo.

So cruise on over, and take a soul-soothing look at cute baby animals – endangered ones, at that. It’s helped my political angst considerably.

Woman Raises Rabbit in Her Bra

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 19:15:00 GMT

Breasts and baby bunnies: two cuddly, loveable entities. Put them together, and you get a healthy three-month-old rabbit who answers to the name Miracle and enjoys watching a good game of cricket.

When her dog killed a rabbit, Cherida Cannon planned to make a good soup—until she noticed that the hare was pregnant. She extracted the living baby from the dead rabbit’s womb and turned her over to the care of her sister, Margi Heath.

Heath nursed the baby to health by keeping her inside her bra, which seemed to her like the warmest, most womblike place for the bunny to be. Whenever the bunny got hungry, she popped her head out of the brassiere, and Heath fed her infant formula with a syringe.

Miracle is now almost grown up and quite tame. Heath walks her on a leash and often takes her to local cricket games in a cat carrier.

Photo: Julian Simmonds/The Telegraph

Man Performs C-Section on Deer Hit by Car

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 17:50:00 GMT

No good deed goes unpunished—particularly when baby animals and bureaucracy are involved. A 67-year-old Canadian man is under investigation for saving a baby deer’s life, something that conservation officers believe should have been left to them.

Hank Van-Til was driving home one day when he saw a truck hit a deer, sending it into a ditch. Van-Til pulled over and discovered that the doe was pregnant. An animal lover who has worked with cows all his life, Van-Til used a knife to perform a Caesarean section on the dying deer. Once the baby had been safely delivered, Van-Til milked the mother and fed the baby deer with his hands. Then he brought the deer home, named him Dickie, and nursed him out of a bottle filled with maple syrup, Carnation milk, and hot water.

A few days later, Department of Natural Resources officers seized the deer and told Van-Til that he could face criminal charges for bringing home an orphaned animal without a permit. While this is a sensible law, designed to prevent harmful human meddling in the animal world, it seems wrong to apply it to Van-Til, whose particular meddling resulted in nothing but good. Perhaps the best solution would have been to grant Van-Til a permit to care for the four-day-old deer, who can not be safely returned to the wild.

Van-Til has taken the loss of Dickie hard. “I don’t know what happened to that deer, or what’s going to happen to it and I don’t trust the [conservation] rangers,” he said, adding, “I did my part and I’m really sad about it. It hurts.”

Photo: naturalhorsetrim.com

Buffalos Open a Can of Whup-Ass

Kelly Mills — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 22:55:00 GMT

There's a long list of things I can't handle now that I'm a parent. News stories about abused or kidnapped children. Movies like Babel. Books that have a child death as a plot device. Shoot, Eric Clapton's "Tears in Heaven" could send me into a tailspin now.

But you know what tops that list? Nature shows. Because the circle of life often involves baby animals being eaten. Yeah, yeah, it's a wild kingdom out there, but I don't care. I'm content to be a wussy.

So I got all choked up when I watched this video via So Close about lions and a croc fighting over a baby buffalo. It reminded me too much of sending my kid to kindergarten. But then, the buffalos form a posse, and...well, check out what happens. Don't mess with a buffalo baby!

Strollerderby : baby animals

Babies for Your Babies

Baby Moose Falls Through Window into Family Home

Mother Elephant Accidentally Poops on Her Baby

Morning News: Rare Baby Gorilla Born in D.C.

Rare Baby Rhinos Found

Nature Lovers Also Annoyed About Children's Dictionary

Lego Santa Crab Will Frighten Children Into Being Good All Year

Stuff You Never Thought You'd Say -- Winter Edition

Fisher Price Chompin' Croc

Toddler Befriends an Orphaned Baby Orangutan

Kid and Kangaroo Best of Friends

Toddler Befriends an Orphaned Baby Orangutan

World's Cutest Monkey Rejected by His Mom

Look! Over Here! Baby Animals!

Woman Raises Rabbit in Her Bra

Man Performs C-Section on Deer Hit by Car

Buffalos Open a Can of Whup-Ass