How Many Bones in a Giraffe's Neck?

Well, this is the place in Paris to find the answer. This is La Galerie de Paléontologie at Le Musée National d'Histoire Naturelle (that's French for bone museum). "A Night at the Museum" would be a very different movie if it happened here. Or maybe not, I never actually saw the movie. Most of you voted for twenty-one vertebrae in a giraffe's neck. And...most of you were wrong. If you take a close look, you'll see that a giraffe has only seven bones from its head to its shoulders. Amazingly, so do you. Yours are just a wee bit shorter is all.

All that height is good for a giraffe in the wild. It lets them eat the tasty leaves that others can't reach and they can see when pesky meat eaters may be lurking nearby.

So, have you ever wondered what a pod of whale zombies might look like? Wonder no more.

Have you ever seen a cuter skull? Be honest now. It's from a tiny monkey called a Buffon macaque.

Two mouths. Two noses. Two eyes. Too bad it is too hard to live like that.

Birds have bones, of course, but did you know they are hollow so the heavy bones don't keep them from flying?

Sure, you've seen a sand dollar. But how about a millions-of-years old sand bank?

Don't forget humans are animals too.

This is a dragonfly fossil. A really big dragonfly fossil. A nearly two-foot wide dragonfly fossil. Imagine that, a dragonfly as big as a hawk.

This may be France, but Madagascar pops up everywhere. There are two bird skeletons in this photo, but these bird bones aren't hollow? Hey, you lied to us! You said birds have hollow bones, so they can fly? Right, but these birds don't fly. The smaller one on the left is a large ostrich. So, if the small one is an ostrich what the heck is the big one? That's a big ol' elephant bird from Madagascar. They are extinct, but they are one of the largest birds ever to walk the Earth. It weighs as much as 125 big chickens. It is as tall as 30 robins. And a whopping 14,000 hummingbird eggs could fit inside just one elephant bird egg. Yeah, 14,000!

Enough elephant bird eggs to hold 84,000 baby hummingbirds.

The glytodon. This extinct fellow is no ordinary armadillo. He is taller than I am.

And what bone museum would be complete without a vicious pointy-toothed dinosaur? 

Madagascar Morning Meeting

Welcome to the Madagascar Morning Meeting. It is great to see you all. Well, maybe not "see", but you understand. Before we begin, let's make sure you know where Madagascar is. Give the globe a good ol' spin and see if you can find where I am and where you are.

Greeting:

Morning Meetings start with a greeting, so click on the movie below to get started. (The movie was filmed while I was still in France a week or so ago).

Activity:

Madagascar kids do have some games that are all their own, but today we will play one that you and they both already know. I'll explain the rules; you see if you can figure out what game it is. Everyone needs to sit in a circle. One person will be "it" to start. She will walk around the circle gently touching each person on the shoulder as she goes. Do you know the game yet? If you think it is Duck, Duck, Goose, you're wrong. This is Madagascar. Here they call it Gàna Fòtsy, Gàna Mèna. It means White Duck, Red Duck, but the game is exactly the same. When someone says Gàna Mèna, the chase is on. Good luck and, since you are inside, no running. If you run, you go to the middle. Unless of course you want to pop outside for a couple of minutes. Then you could run.

P.S. Here's some help with the pronunciation. White duck sounds like this, "Gana foots" (but the "foots" sounds like "hoots" except with an "f"). Red duck sounds like this, "Gana men."

Sharing:

Scroll on down the page and have a look see at one of the posts. Your teacher knows which one is best for you, but here's a reminder:

Grades K-2 should read the post that is just under this one and it is called "Out of the City and Into the Country."

Grades 3-5 should read the post that is two below this one and it is called "Back in Madagascar Again."

Please, please, please, please, please, please leave a comment when you're done reading. I would very much love to hear from you.

Goodbye:

I hope you had a good time and learned a few things about Madagascar. If you would like to do this again, just let your teacher know and maybe we could do one meeting every month. I miss you all. Take care

Velòma.

Out of the City and into the Country

[This is a repost of an older post to make it easier to find for Littlebrook's Madagascar Morning Meeting. It was originally posted on February 15, 2009.]

Sorry it's been so long since I put a post on the blog. My wife and I were at a scientific research site along the southeast coast. The town is Mahabo if you have a really good map and want to look it up. There is no electricity at the site and certainly no internet, so I couldn't send you any updates for the 7 days I was there. I'm back now, so I can get back to blogging. 

A few interesting things are happening here. Right now there are 2 Presidents. They are fighting about who gets to be the one official President. This is not an election like we just had in America. They are fighting and arguing about who should be in charge. They are using mostly words and big protests, but there has been some people hurt and killed in all the arguing. Some people have been burning TV stations and robbing the grocery stores. We have been very safe, but is certainly different than living in Princeton.

Anyway, here are some great photos from our trip to the research station. This was in a very rural area. The people live in one-room reed and wood huts with roofs made of the rice stalks leftover from harvesting their rice paddies. Very few people have electricity and no one we saw had running water. They speak a different version of the Malagasy language too. No one speaks French there, so we had to use a lot of charades to talk to people. A cyclone was hitting nearby, so there were some fantastic storms to watch as well.

An insect eating pitcher plant. The insects get stuck at the bottom of that tube and then the plants juices dissolve and eat the insects. 
That is if the insects make it that far. In this picture you can see a small white web from a spider that is using the plant as a trap to catch the insects before they get to the tube. Clever, huh.
Cute frog. Its about the size of a marshmallow. I don't know the name. Maybe you can identify it.
Who needs a backpack. Heads work just fine.
An ant enjoying a delicious meal served from this plants gland. The plant wants to ants to come, because the ants help protect the plant from other more damaging insects.
This praying mantis is having a nice little picnic. The cicada is not.
Giant snails were crawling all over the forest floor. They are about the size of baseballs and our guide said they are delicious.
Forget to bring a raincoat to the rain forest? Not a problem. Just strap on a big palm leaf.

There's no furniture stores in the rain forest. The villagers pick this sphagnum, dry it, and stuff into sheets to make mattresses.
Some adorable kittens who live at the research center.
A very scared house mouse who lived outside our bungalow.
One of a few thousand crabs running around the beach.
A big ol' unidentified snake. It was about 2 meters long (6 feet). 

Back in Madagascar Again

I'm pretty sure that I ate the ear of a pig this week. But it is hard to tell about these things in Madagascar. But that story is for another day. Today, I'd like to talk about our return to the island. We were in France and England for the past two months for my wife's work, but now after a very long plane ride we are back in Madagascar. Outside of our city, it is as lovely as ever. 

But inside of our city, we see a lot of this: trucks full of soldiers and policemen. They are there because of the crazy politics in Madagascar right now. What the heck are politics? Well, politics are all the things that have to do with presidents, mayors, governments, courts and all that.

The politics in America have been very interesting lately with the newly elected President Obama. Well, there is a new president in Madagascar too, but the new president here was not elected like in America. This new president kicked the old president out by holding big rallies and marches. Then he used the army to force the old president out of his offices and houses. The people of Madagascar have suffered through all of this. Many people have been hurt and more than 100 people have lost their lives. 

Most of the world does like the way the new president took over the country and the old president is trying to come back. A lot of the people in our city want the old president back too, so they have been having marches and rallies every day. 

These are some supporters of the old president. I may have been the only American at the rally of 5,ooo people, but there was at least one American flag as well. People started pushing and fighting at the end of the rally and that night other people began to throw rocks and fight the police.

Many people were hurt and one police officer died. The rally the next day became a funeral for the police officer.

Some of the angry protesters burn cars during the riots. This car is near our house and just down the street from my wife's office.

People also block the streets with anything they can find. The street to our house was blocked by a huge pile of stinky trash. These men are cleaning it up the next morning. 

All of this should seem very weird to you. That's because you are lucky enough to live in a country that has elections instead of fighting. And whether it is Princeton or Antananarivo or anywhere, those who are lucky should do what they can to help those that aren't. My wife and I are lucky to have a nice safe house to live in, clean water to drink and plenty of food, so it is our job to help others. My wife helps to protect the plants and animals of the island with her research. And I have started helping with the Malagasy Red Cross. I volunteer on their ambulance and teach classes about medicine and speaking English. 

There are always people who aren't as lucky as you. Please do what you can to help others.

Take a Ride on the Dodo-Go-Round

Paris is so beautiful it can make your head spin. It can make the rest of you spin too, because the city is crawling with wonderful carousels. Around every corner is another chance to hop on a wooden horse and bob up and down as the sites of the city whirl past. Some are as frilly as Cinderella's gown, some are bright and covered in a thousand twinkling lights, and some are even two-stories tall. 

But this is the story of one very special carousel. When I first saw it, I grabbed my camera to take a photo of the "funny" giraffes spinning around and around. The giraffes were "funny", because instead of their horns being just little furry bumps, they were flat sprawling moose antlers. Instead of long lady-like necks that swayed like breezy palms, they had stout strong necks like galloping horses. I thought they looked magical. Maybe some happy French kids astride some unicorns and griffins would spin around next.

But a one-horned shiny-maned steed is not what spun into view. Where an elegant magical beast like the "wild moose-giraffe" should be was a dumpy little bird with a beak the size of a banana. "Hey, that's a dodo!" I said. Then I read the name of the carousel: The Dodo Merry-Go-Round.

Duh! These weren't magical creatures; these were extinct creatures. What a marvelous idea! What a wonderful lesson this would be! 

So here it is: A little lesson compliments of the Dodo-Go-Round.

 

Click the play button to see the the Dodo-Go-Round in action.

Dodo [Click on the bold titles to learn more.]

Here's the bird you probably all know. You'll never see one alive, but some people did. The last dodo walked around the island of Mauritius more than 300 years ago. People are the reason there are no more dodos, but it's not because they killed and ate them all. In fact, people even made a point to write down how bad dodos tasted. But when humans came to the island, they brought other animals like pigs, dogs, and parrots and it was those animals that ended up eating dodo eggs and hogging all the food that normally fed the dodo.

Elephant Bird

And you thought ostriches were big? Well, ostriches are like little chickens compared to this long-necked fellow. In fact, this bird really was as big as Big Bird on Sesame Street. If one walked into your room right now, the feathers on it's head would be scraping the ceiling. They weighed 1,000 pounds (that's as much as an entire class of kindergartners). And where did these giants live? Well, they actually lived in Madagascar and people still find their enormous fossilized eggs that can fit over 150 chicken eggs inside. 

Glyptodon

If a small car suddenly sprouted four short strong legs and started eating your front lawn, it would be something like the glyptodon. Go back 12,000 years to the end of the last ice age and you might find one of the of these giant armadillo-turtle-bears. They came up to your teacher's chin, were as long as a car and were covered in fur and had a very heavy turtle-like shell on their back and a helmet on their head.

Barbary Lion

Hey, lions aren't extinct! You're right. But there's not just one species of lion. Just like there are more than one species of squirrel. This species lion is called a Barbary lion and it is extinct, but you can still go see one run around and hear it roar. Wait, that doesn't make any sense? Right again. Just like there is more than one kind of lion, there is more than one kind of extinct. Truly extinct animals like the dodo are all dead and gone, but the Barbary lion is extinct in the wild, which means the only living animals are found in zoos not in the forests, mountains or deserts.

Mountain Gorilla

Now I'll make it even a little more confusing. This is a mountain gorilla and they are not extinct at all. You don't have to go to the zoo to see one. You could hop on a jet and fly to the mountains in the middle of Africa. The few mountain gorillas that still survive in the wild have to compete for food and land with humans who are farming and fighting on the edge of the forests where they live. That is why they are a critically endangered (not extinct) species. There are only about 700 of these gorillas left in the world. That's about the number of students at Littlebrook and Community Park.

Triceratops

This is one you already know a lot about, so I won't say too much about this extinct and pointy boy. I will say that those three sharp horns were not for fighting hungry toothy foes like t-rex. A lot of scientists now believe they were for finding a date. They are like the pretty red feathers on a male cardinal (that bright red bird we have flitting around Princeton). In other words, they didn't use their horns for poking things; they used them to look pretty. 

African Elephant

This is another pointy creature, but this one is not extinct...yet. It is endangered, because people have destroyed a lot of their habitat. But the biggest problem is that some people would kill the giant plant eaters just to cut off their tusks and sell them. But the people who shot the elephants aren't the only ones to blame. The people who bought things made of the elephant ivory are just as responsible too. Most people don't buy things made of ivory anymore and the African elephant is making a pretty good comeback right now, but not everywhere. 

Tasmanian Wolf

This is the most recent of the animals on the Dodo-Go-Round to disappear. The last poor wolf died in a zoo in Tasmania in 1936. Most of them were killed by hunters for reward money or by farmers to protect their animals. This was an extraordinary wolf. It had a pouch like a kangaroo and could open its mouth as wide as a rattlesnake. This wolf almost became the first extinct animal to be brought back to to life. A few years ago, scientists began to try and clone a brand new Tasmanian Wolf from some of the old dead wolves in museums. They haven't done it yet, but who knows. Maybe when you are older the Tasmanian wolf won't be extinct anymore. How amazing is that? Do you think they should bring dinosaurs back to life too?

Horned Tortoise

Now that's one angry-looking turtle. Well, maybe that's not fair. First of all, it's hard to smile when you have a beak. Second of all, tortoises aren't turtles. Well, even that isn't completely true (science can be a bit confusing sometimes). All tortoises are turtles, but not all turtles are tortoises. Sort of like all squares are rectangles, but not all rectangles are squares. Tortoises spend their lives on land and only go into the water to drink or take a bath. The last horned tortoise died 2,000 years ago. If one of these armored giants could have stood up on it's back legs it would be about as tall as Yao Ming (but sadly, their sharp claws made them terrible at dribbling...just kidding...about the dribbling...they did actually have sharp claws).

Giant Panda

We all know a good bit about this black and white bear, so I'll keep it simple but interesting. The Panda is not extinct, but it is most certainly endangered. The only place to find them is in China. Panda babies are not only absurdly cute, they are also the tiniest mammal babies in the world. When they are born, their mother is 900 times bigger! If that were true for you, your mom would be the size of a small school bus. Or, if your mom was the same size she is now, you would have to be born about the size and weight of a nickel.

Sivatherium

And finally, the giraffe-moose thingy. This is actually one of the great-great-great-great grandparents of the giraffes we know and love today. The last sivatherium lived in Africa about 8,000 years ago and some old cave paintings even show these shorter horned giraffes. They actually had two sets of horns: one larger set on top and a smaller set closer to the eyes. Giraffes today only have one smaller set of fur-covered horns on top. And giraffes have really grown "up" in the past 8,000 years too. Have your teacher hold her hand in the air. That's about as tall as big sivatherium. Now have your teacher stand on another teacher's shoulders. Then have those two teachers stand on another teacher's shoulders. Then still have your teacher reach up her hand and she might be able to scratch one of the furry horns on a modern male giraffe. They're big (giraffes, not your teachers).