Conspiracy unmasked

I've always been dubious about the Humane Society of the United States. Here's some interesting evidence that I've been right to be suspicious of them - but for reasons that are somewhat different than I had imagined. Consider the following excerpts of descriptions of the nominees for the HSUS Dog of Valor award - italics added:

Benson: Barked and alerted his owners to a fire across the street...

Calamity Jane: Scared away intruders by ferociously barking ...

Max: Barked incessantly, leading his owner to investigate...

Porkchop: Bayed and barked until he got a neighbor’s attention...

RaeLee: Barked and ran down the hall...

Prozac: Barked and alerted family...

The remaining nominees are described - obviously by a web copywriter desperate to avoid repeating the same word in every description - as having "run through the house and howled," "Cried and ran through the house," and finally "awakened owner."

And if you think you can guess how that last dog awakened its owner, you are right: here's the start of the full story of the grand prize winner:

It was 4 a.m. when Kenai, a 14-year-old Bernese mountain dog mix, started to whine and bark.

So: Am I the only one who thinks we've finally unmasked HSUS as a front group for incessantly barking dogs? I've got someone who lives across the street who's obviously a member, and I'll bet you do too. Let's make it clear to all these peace-disturbing canines: the nominees for this award may indeed have saved lives, but that does NOT give all the rest of you a free pass!


Poster from unpleasant-sounding play, by Flickr user Phil Gyford.

The war between dogs and chickens

You'd think dogs would feel secure in their place as humanity's favorite pet. (Yes, statistically there are more cats, but that's because there are many multiple cat households. However, more people own dogs.)

And you'd think there's nothing unusual about killing a chicken, as far as bad dog behavior goes. Even a recent story like the one about the hen that adopted a litter of rottweiler puppies is unlikely to make a fundamental change in the dynamic between the two species.

But keep reading the story headlined "Plucky the chicken dies after dog attack" and the plot seems to thicken:

The loss has hit the Hawkes family hard. Plucky came into their lives a year and a half ago when Sharan Hawkes’s husband, John, found the chicken wandering around in front of their home.

She became the family pet, living in a coop in the backyard of the Dix Street home.

And the Hawkes family launched an effort to change Waltham’s zoning regulations to allow homeowners to keep one chicken as a pet.

Chicken-keeping is reportedly become more and more popular. Is it possible that dogs feel threatened by the possibility that our pet-owning choices could be broadened? That perhaps they realize that chickens not only don't get hair on the sofa or jump up and slobber on guests, but they even contribute something to the household in the way of foodstuffs?

If that was the underlying motivation for this heinous act, the Hawkes family of Waltham vows not to let it succeed:

If the measure does pass, the family intends to buy another pet chicken.

"In Plucky’s name we’re going to continue this," she said.

Hen mom who should not expect any gratitude from the Daily Mail.

"We're lucky these things aren't the size of ravens."

This blog has often observed that the cuter we think an animal is, the worse the truth about it (I'm looking at you, dolphins).

If you don't believe me, maybe you'll believe the excellent and well known wildlife writer Richard Conniff when he writes about hummingbirds:

"These creatures have a following like mythical beasts," said one of the guides, a little ruefully. "There are people who don't care anything about birds, or other wildlife or nature, but they love hummingbirds. We had one woman tell us: "I just love hummingbirds and unicorns." And I don't think she drew any distinction between the two."

The guide's name was Tom Wood. He was from the Southeastern Arizona Bird Conservatory. "People come in," he continued, "and they say, "They're so tiny, and they're so sweet," and we'll say, "Well, they are tiny." Wood trained his binoculars on a feeder. The glittering fragments of rainbow were at that moment swatting and screaming at one another in a relentless bid to get to the head of the line. "They're fighter pilots in small bodies. We've seen a bird knock another hummingbird out of the air and stab it with its bill. People still don't believe it. They think they're little fairies." He shrugged. "We're probably lucky these things aren't the size of ravens, or it would not be safe to walk in the woods."

A bit later in the article in his book Swimming with the Piranhas at Feeding Time is the following:

A scientific paper about the rufous hummingbird includes this endearing notation: "SOCIAL BEHAVIOR: None. Individual survival seems only concern."

This should be enough for anyone, but if it's not, how about the page on hummingbird behavior here, which explains:

When hummingbirds fight, they puff themselves up to look as large as possible. They will spread their wings and tail feathers out as large as possible, and they will use their beaks and claws as weapons. They will chirp warnings as they head toward each other. Hummingbirds have been known to body slam each other in mid air and even lock their bills together while spinning in a circle until they hit the ground.

Consider that that was written by people who actually like hummingbirds, enough to write a whole website about them. It goes on to tell a story about how hummingbirds are so aggressive toward other hummingbirds that they repeatedly attacked a plaque of fake decorative hummingbirds.

And in case that after all that, you still want to put out feeders to actually attract these creatures, they advise as follows:

To avoid hummingbirds from causing too much injury, put out a lot of hummingbird feeders either spaced far apart or all bunched together so there is no way one hummingbird can guard them all. Don't bother to try and stop them from fighting. It's best to just leave them alone and let them work it out. We have a rule on the top deck of the World of Hummingbirds: Hummingbird Farm of "no body-slamming". Whenever the hummingbirds start to body-slam each other, we yell, "Hey". Now they just do it when they think no one is looking.

Hummingbird fight by Flickr user hickoryhollow113.

Updates: Animals behaving humanly

We reported recently on a cat that took the ferry to Spain from England. Concern that this was a symptom of a bigger problem was confirmed by our crack bad behavior research team, which dug up two stories about dogs that take the subway in Moscow. One, in the Financial Times, quotes extensively from a biologist that studies the packs of stray dogs living in the city:

Neuronov says there are some 500 strays that live in the metro stations, especially during the colder months, but only about 20 have learned how to ride the trains. This happened gradually, first as a way to broaden their territory. Later, it became a way of life. “Why should they go by foot if they can move around by public transport?” he asks.

Regular readers of this blog won't be surprised that these strays have their human enablers:

The metro dog also has uncannily good instincts about people, happily greeting kindly passers by, but slinking down the furthest escalator to avoid the intolerant older women who oversee the metro’s electronic turnstiles. “Right outside this metro,” says Neuronov, gesturing toward Frunzenskaya station, a short distance from the park where we were speaking, “a black dog sleeps on a mat. He’s called Malish. And this is what I saw one day: a bowl of freshly ground beef set before him, and slowly, and ever so lazily, he scooped it up with his tongue while lying down.”

Dogs aren't the only lazy animals who've gotten the idea that human transportation is a good deal. We've previously seen a bird trying to hitch a ride on a plane, and now there's also this video of a pigeon taking the subway in Toronto.

These animals might be interested to know what happened to a cat in England who took the same bus every day for four years: he was killed by a hit and run driver while crossing the road to get to the bus stop. His owner was quoted in the Daily Mail:

She said: 'Casper was quite quick for his age but I was trying to stop him from riding the bus so much.

'He had no road sense whatsoever but he loved people.

'He'd queue up in line good as gold - it'd be 'person, person, person, cat, person, person'.'

Sad, but instructive. As we humans well know, taking advantage of our transportation technology has its downsides. Maybe animals - who can already run, climb, swim and fly better than we can - should stick to what they're good at.

Moving on: this video from Japan, always on the forefront of treating animals humanly, shows a family that sends its pet penguin to the grocery store on its own. We have to grant that at least this penguin is pulling its weight in the household more than most animals do.

The Japanese are probably also not helping matters by believing that some of their cats can actually speak.

A final quick addition to a topic we have been following: add cigarettes and coffee to the list of substances that bees like to abuse, which already included bees alcohol and cocaine. Scientists in Israel found that they also prefer nectar that is spiked with caffeine and nicotine.


Dog on the Moscow metro by Flickr user Adam Baker.

If animals want rights, they can pay their own bills too

This blog is constantly demonstrating that animals treat people badly. But it in no way advocates that we treat them likewise in return. If nothing else, we wouldn't want to lower ourselves to their level.

We're not even going to nitpick when laws protecting animals come close to mollycoddling, such as the Swiss laws that forbid flushing goldfish down the toilet and require that guinea pigs and canaries be kept with roommates.

But we're relieved to report that yesterday, the Swiss voted against a proposed law that would have required the government to provide free lawyers to represent animals in court.

The lawyer widely quoted in articles leading up to the vote is famed for representing a dead fish in a case arguing that it was cruel for a fisherman to spend ten minutes attempting to land it. This blog was almost on the fish's side till we read that it had committed the unforgivable sin of having more Facebook friends than we do (reportedly over 6,000.)

We're not saying that animals don't deserve legal representation. We're just saying that if animals are going to start taking jobs that people could otherwise have (as we've seen most recently here and here), then, let them pay for their lawyers with their own damn money like the rest of us have to.


Law dog by flickr user Jurisdog.

Bad behavior briefs

Zhora, a chimp in Russia, has been sent to rehab to treat his smoking and drinking habit. Some reports imply that this tragedy is all the fault of zoo visitors who, despite the pleas of management and a barrier of three fences, managed to supply Zhora with booze and cigarettes. But as Reuters quotes the zoo director:

"The beer and cigarettes were ruining him. He would pester passers-by for booze."

Let's be clear on who's really to blame here: you can hand a chimp a beer, but you can't make him drink.

And in other news from man's "best friend," no comment is necessary on this report headlined German Man Betrayed to Police by Own Pet Dog:

When officers called at his flat in Euskirchen, near Cologne, the door was opened by an acquaintance of the missing man who was holding the dog.

The acquaintance said he did not know where the owner was.

But when the dog was set down, it led police to the cupboard, where it stood expectantly with its tail wagging.

Officers who opened the cupboard, which was just a metre (3ft 3in) high and 80cm (2ft 6in) wide, found the fugitive "hunched up inside".

In case you're looking for a breed that would be a better partner in crime, the dog was reported to be a Jack Russell.


Smoking and drinking chimp by Flickr user Steve9091.

How NOT to treat a cat

I have always suspected that cats are a kind of parasitic species on humans, surviving by controlling our minds so that we think they're wonderful and want to serve them. In fact mind control is the only explanation I can think of for the fact that in well over a year, there have been only about four posts on this blog about the bad behavior of domestic cats. It's certainly not for lack of material.

We need to be on the lookout for signs that cats are getting ready to make their move and take over. They're quietly starting to usurp human privileges, as we saw in this recent post where a cat took the ferry to spain.

The place to keep our eye on is clearly Japan. The Japanese are compounding the problem of cats' excessive self-esteem by running cat cafes, where people pay to hang out with cats and drink tea. Cats are full enough of themselves already, the last thing we need to is show them that humans are willing to pay money for brief periods of their company.

Even worse is that they're allowing cats to hold responsible jobs. One cat in Japan was already stationmaster of a railroad station. The station even hired a human assistant for the cat, called Tama, to direct the many visitors who come to see her.

After only a fairly brief tenure, Tama was given her own office and a promotion to 'super-stationmaster,' at which point it was reported, appallingly, that she was the only female of any species to hold a managerial position in the railroad company.

As if all of this (and having her own Wikipedia entry on top of vast amounts of media coverage) wasn't enough, Tama has now been promoted to operating officer:

"This is the first time in the world for a cat to become an executive of a railroad corporation, a company official said."

Well thank goodness, at least, that this is the first and only case - let's keep it that way!



Photo of Tama dressed for duty from Wikimedia Commons

Science filling in the details of bad animal behavior

If you think bad animal behavior is just a lark, suitable for blogging and a laugh, you're wrong. It's a serious scientific pursuit. I may get nothing out of this business, but some South African researchers lately got an actual publication out of it: a report in the Journal of Ethology about a seal trying to rape a penguin.

As the BBC reports:

The brazenness of the seal's behaviour left those who saw it in no doubt as to what was happening.

(Researchers) De Bruyn and a colleague were on Trypot beach at Marion Island to study elephant seals when they noticed a young, adult male Antarctic fur seal, in good condition, attempting to copulate with an adult king penguin of unknown sex.

The 100kg seal first subdued the 15kg penguin by lying on it.

The penguin flapped its flippers and attempted to stand and escape - but to no avail.

The seal then alternated between resting on the penguin, and thrusting its pelvis, trying to insert itself, unsuccessfully.

You have to give credit to both the scientists and the BBC for having a much more realistic view of animal behavior than most. They don't express surprise at the mere fact of attempted animal sexual assault, which we've seen on this blog with animals as varied as frogs and dolphins:

Sexual coercion among animals is extremely common: males of many species often harass, coerce or force females of their own kind to mate, while animals are also known occasionally to harass sexually a member of a closely related species.

They even realize that these incidents aren't confined to members of the same species - as we've seen, again, with dolphins and with a parrot who've had humans as the objects of their attentions. So, the researchers are quite precise about what's unusual about this incident:

But this is thought to be the first recorded example of a mammal trying to have sex with a member of another class of vertebrate, such as a bird, fish, reptile, or amphibian.

This is what is comes down to: bad animal sexual behavior is so widespread, you've got to get that specific to get a scientific "first" out of it.

The researchers consider various possible motives for the behavior, from aggression to playfulness. But if it was a misdirected attempt at cross-order romance, he's definitely doing it wrong:

After 45 minutes the seal gave up, swam into the water and then completely ignored the bird it had just assaulted.

Really, at least send flowers - or some fish - if you're not going to call, you know?


You can read the whole article here, if you're into that sort of thing.

Thanks to Sir Pilkington's weirdimals Twitter for the tip. Photo of a different unnatural arrangement of a seal and a penguin by Flickr user shaindlin.

Bad animals as a weapon against bad animals

Sometime it seems that this blog could just as well be called "Humans never learning," but as we saw in the previous post, there are some exceptions, where people have stood up to bad animal behavior instead of making excuses for it.

Now, in an interesting twist on this, humans are actually using bad animals against bad animals in Australia.

Humans often do animals the favor of broadening their horizons by taking them to see the world, and typically, animals tend to repay this by devastating their new homes. We've seen this in the case of the brown tree snake in Guam, which has basically eaten all the native wildlife as well as committing various offenses more directly against humans.

Another famous example is the cane toad. Farmers brought cane toads to Australia in the 1930s, and, in exchange for a whole new continent to live on, they asked only that the toads eat a certain beetle that infests sugar cane fields. Seems like a fair deal, right?

Instead, the toads pretty much ignored the beetles and instead have spread over Australia, devastating the native wildlife, as you can learn in the book and movie Cane Toads: An Unnatural History, which I highly recommend as a true cinematic milestone in the documentation of bad animal behavior.

Years of attempts to control the invading amphibians have failed, but now scientists may have found a simple solution: a little cat food, which gets you the help of an extremely nasty little insect, the carnivorous meat ant.

As reported by The Telegraph:

"It's not exactly rocket science. We went out and put out a little bit of cat food right beside the area where the baby toads were coming out of the ponds," University of Sydney professor Rick Shine told public broadcaster ABC.

"The ants rapidly discovered the cat food and thought it tasted great."

Attracted by the cat food, the ants also mercilessly attack the baby toads, eliminating about 70% of them immediately, and most of the toads that escape the initial attack die later as well.

Targeting the toads as they hatch is a particularly efficient approach, since the eggs are laid in huge masses and tens of thousands of young may be emerging at the same time. And the ants have an important quality: they're impervious to the toxins that the toads use to defend themselves from predators.

It sounds foolproof, but I'd watch out for one thing: how are those ants going to "thank" us later for the fantastic free meals?


Check out this site for a terrifying closeup of the meat ant (scroll down past the perfectly innocuous meat ant researcher) as well as tons of information direct from cane toad experts, and here you can read about the new sequel to the Cane Toads movie.

Ominous closeup of a cane toad where it ought to be, in central America, by Flickr user Brian Gratwicke.

Hail to Heroic Humans

So many of the humans in the stories reported in this blog just don't get it. Again and again, we've seen people make excuses for animals or, worse, even enable them.

So it's a pleasure to recognize a couple of true role models in the fight against bad animal behavior.

In the first case, a squirrel was put in its place when it was banned from riding a rollercoaster in England.

Workers noticed it riding the revamped Sonic Spinball roller coaster as it was tested in the mornings and joining visitors who were offered an early go on it before the official opening.

The grey-haired animal was also caught stealing food from the workers.

A spokesman for the Staffordshire theme park said: "It was getting in the way of builders who were painting. They couldn't carry on because they would end up with paw prints in the paint."

Alarms were installed that emit a warning noise inaudible to human ears but designed to ensure the squirrel, nicknamed Sonic, avoids the ride in future.

I'm sure we can all agree that that's the sort of thing we want to see more of. But even more impressive is the case of a woman who was attacked by a shark while snorkling and escaped by punching it.

"I thought 'this shark's not going to get the better of me' and I started punching it on the nose, punching, punching, punching," she told local media.

"And then it got me under the water, but not much because I started kicking at its neck."

She lost quite a lot of blood and is going to have to undergo a number of surgeries, but the woman sees a bright side. Apparently there are unanticipated rewards for those who stand up to bad animals:

"I have to have a new remodelled bottom, so that's a positive," she said.

Photo of that stinking scofflaw squirrel from The Mail.

Game bird revolt crosses the pond

Perhaps it's no surprise that it all began where Thanksgiving started: For years, turkeys have been attacking people in Massachussetts.

But recently, as we saw in November, the same behavior has sprung up elsewhere: in Philadelphia, and although the tactics were different, I think we can also count the turkey in New Jersey who was trying to cause accidents at a freeway exit.

A more ominous development has now come out of England - you know, the old England. Since there are no wild turkeys there, it appears that other tasty game birds are being recruited to the cause - in this case, a pheasant. According to The Telegraph:

The vicious bird has launched several unprovoked attacks on villagers in recent weeks.

Men, women, children, prams, bikes, dogs and cars are said to have have fallen foul of the bird in Newsham, near Richmond, North Yorkshire.

There are tales of the plucky cock lying in wait for children to get off the school bus, before chasing them screaming to the village green.

One grandmother was left with a scar on her leg after being unable to beat the bird off with her handbag, and the postman is reportedly unwilling to deliver mail to the village for fear of attack. Another resident says that the bird tried to get into her house.

Despite treating the entire town like his property, the pheasant's main residence is the yard of one villager, who, like many of the people involved in these incidents, is entirely unclear whose side she is on. At first, she sounds like someone who's got her head screwed on straight:

"At first we thought he was a friendly bird because he would always like to come out and make his presence felt when anyone called round.

But he's actually quite an unpleasant bird, not very nice at all. He jumps up at the kids' school bags. It's worrying how he's gone on to attack people."

But then she goes on:

"We are happy enough for him to stay for the time being but if the attacks go on I'm sure he won't be around for long.

We haven't seen him for a couple of days which is a bit worrying."

People, when will you learn?



Photo of mad-eyed pheasant, hopefully via zoom lens from a great distance, from The Telegraph.

Prominent position for pervert parrot

As we have seen again and again, it's no wonder animals keep acting the way they do when people so often actually reward them for their bad behavior. In perhaps the most fantastic example so far, a parrot in New Zealand has been given a prominent government job in response to his worldwide fame - as a pervert.

A kakopo named Sirocco, member of a highly endangered New Zealand species, became an internet sensation due to a video clip in which he pleasured himself upon the head of naturalist Mark Carwardine, who was filming a TV series based on his book with the late Douglas Adams. (In case you haven't already seen this clip, you can click here. Or, more tastefully, not.)

Now, this perverted kakapo has been appointed official government "spokesbird" for conservation. The prime minister says of the bird:

“He’s very media-savvy, he’s got a worldwide fan base – they hang on every squawk that comes out of his beak. He’ll be a great official spokesbird for New Zealand,” he said.“Sirocco can speak very loudly on this topic and by the end of this campaign people will be a lot more aware of what’s going on.”

I probably don't need to tell you that the bird now has his own website, Facebook page, Twitter feed, etc.

I am appalled by the precedent that has been set here. Now that birds know that this is how to get ahead... well, for one thing, I think I'm going to start wearing a hat.

Even I can't think of a way to blame this on animals

Please excuse the temporary blogging outage due to snowpocalypse. To tide you over check out dogs shooting people at Dogster and some interesting warning signs from zoos.

Brief bad behavior updates

-In a recent post, a passing mention was made of elephants attending prenatal classes.

I'd have made a bigger point of this if I'd realized it was the start of a trend. Now we see elephants being taught to play basketball.

I'm concerned that these attempts to infiltrate our educational system are just the tip of the iceberg - an ominous step up from the animals getting fake online degrees. If there are any college admissions personnel reading this blog, please be on the alert and report if you get any applications that smell of pachyderm.

-In another recent post we debunked the motivations of an orangutan that has become famous for taking photographs.

We are confident that readers of this blog will be equally unimpressed by chimps who are making a movie and will not be fooled into buying Valentines gifts painted by penguins. Check out the link at Zooborns for more photos and description of this flightless artistic hoax.

Rabbit with a habit

If there's one thing this blog proves, it's that animals have all kinds of vices that you might have imagined were purely human. We've seen animals indulging in lust, vanity, drunkenness, gluttony, laziness, and lying, just to name a few.

There is almost nothing left... almost. But this one surprised even me: a rabbit in England that is addicted to gambling.

This compulsive gambler bunny is obsessed with a slot machine in the pub where he lives in Worcestershire. Pub landlord Ian Randall brought the rabbit indoors to escape a cold snap, and claims that his customers "took to him straight away." Apparently at least one of the rabbit's other vices fits right in: He enjoys cider - which in an English pub, does not refer to a fruit juice for children.

But aside from hogging what they call the "fruit machine," the rabbit has other unseemly behaviors, according to the Worcester News:

As well as trying his luck on the fruit machine Daisy has also been getting fruity with Mr Randall’s sons’ toy rabbit.

"Daisy" is a male, despite the name, and putting that together with the colorful pictures of tasty fruit on the machine and the alcoholic indulgence, he may well be a very confused bunny indeed. But while most of the pub's patrons are tolerant of this lapine interloper, a few of them are not confused at all about the proper way to react:

"There is a handful of drinkers here who would probably rather put him into a stew though,” Mr Randall said.