Animals vs. Law Enforcement continued: Traffic Division

Despite the fact that dogs love to go for a ride in a car, animals and vehicles are not a good mix. Spring is a particularly bad time of year, when the weather warms up and all kinds of creatures start to dash around, so involved in looking for fresh food and other animals to have sex with that they don't bother to look both ways before crossing the street.

Big wild animals are the most familiar risk. In Maine, authorities are urging motorists to slow down and look for moose, which have already caused at least one highway fatality. "Moose is Maine's most deadly animal," said one official.

But all kinds of animals can cause these problems. Not all are wild: a wandering cow sent two people to the hospital after collisions in Texas. And some are not large at all: a highway in Greece was shut down when millions of frogs crossing it were causing cars to slide off the road.

Elsewhere, officials are doing more than just talk to convince drivers of the danger. In Germany, they've staged crash tests with the model wild boars in the photo above, and the result might convince some drivers to forget about driving and take the train:

But why are we the only ones getting the warnings? 27 humans died and 3,000 were injured in 2009 in Germany, but also, "hundreds of thousands" of animals. Animals can't read the newspaper, but something needs to be done to make them look around and take notice - why isn't someone laminating those photos and passing them around some forests?

Photos from Germany's ADAC auto club via Der Spiegel.

Frightful frog f&#%ing

It would be wrong if this week's posts left the impression that monkeys were the only perverted animal.

Frogs mate in a position called amplexus, where the male gets on the female's back, clasps her with his legs, and hangs on, in some cases for weeks. Frogs don't fertilize their eggs internally, so he's just waiting till she releases her eggs into the water, at which point he'll add his sperm. It doesn't sound like much fun, but frogs don't know any better.

Male frogs can be so persistent about this that they drown the female. They can also engage in a sort of group sex, where more than one male climbs onto the female. Here you can see an excellent example of both phenomena, where many male frogs are still attempting to mate with a dead female wood frog.

If she does survive, scientists have shown by genetic analysis that the female may have young with different fathers in the same clutch. Of course, she doesn't stick around to see which guy the kids resemble, since most species of frogs don't care for their young.

If this doesn't sufficiently convince you of the sad state of frog society, you might want to read this scientific report on frog amplexus in microgravity, conducted at a Japanese amusement park. Yes, frogs had no shame about having sex on an amusement park ride, no doubt surrounded by innocent children.

You might as well just give in and watch this video of a frog orgy, with appropriate soundtrack.




Toads by Flickr user minipixel and Panamanian golden frogs by Flickr user Grufnik.