Wholphins, and Geeps, and Zonkeys, OH MY!
Now, most of us know about Ligers (thanks, Jon Heder) but I had no idea how many other mammal hybrids existed! Here’s a collage of a few of my favs:
Buffalo-cows aka Beefalo, Camel-llama aka Camas, Goat-sheeps aka Geeps, Grizzy-Polar bears aka Grolar Bears, Whale-dolphins aka Wholphins, and various Zebra/Horse/Donkey combos like Zorses* and Zonkeys and Hinnys.
*I swear the Zorse isn’t photoshopped, they actually have patches of stripes and non-striped areas depending on which genes they inherit from their parents
If I ever become extraordinarily rich I’m buying a farm and filling it with nothing but crazy animal hybrids.
Soy’s possible “feminizing” effects
Some scientists speculate that the phytoestrogens (or “dietary estrogensâ€) in soy products may have long-term impacts on the development of both males and females. It is hypothesized that females on soymilk diets might develop earlier because of the increased estrogen and it may have a “feminizing†effect on males.
(I like to think that there’s a very small percentage of you guys that read that last sentence while sipping a tall soy latte and are now frozen with fear, mid-sip)
Don’t worry – that part is all very speculative and there are conflicting studies on this topic. Drinking soymilk will not cause your genitals to suck up into your body cavity nor will it make you sprout breasts all over your back. I just heard about these studies from a colleague and couldn’t wait to write about how soymilk might make mens balls shrink. **
** I’ve recently had the chilling/depressing realization that I’d be really great at writing scary news titles for local TV. “Does using deodorant cause anal leakage? Find out at 10!”
[via The Journal of The American Academy of Pediatrics]
520 Day Mars Flight Simulator “Launched”
The crew, consisting of three Russian men, one French man, one Chinese man, and one Italian man, were sealed inside the flight simulator and will remain there for 520 days. As per normal astronaut protocol they are allowed one shower every 10 days. That’s right – a year and a half of marinating in their spacesuits inside a cramped, sweaty chamber with air that’s ripe with Tang and man-stink.
And while they will have some actual astronauting to do, the researchers observing them are primarily interested in their behavior during the staggeringly long periods of monotony. Here’s where the fun stuff happens! One crewmember is bringing along his guitar (oh man, he’s that guy – I bet he’s the one they kill first), they will get to play one game of internet chess with a famous Russian chess dude, and they will have occasional access to email (via a super shitty internet connection to simulate the delays and interruptions they will encounter in space).
One pretty sweet thing they do get is $100,000, but I don’t think I’d do it for any amount of money – I’d go crazy. And there is a pretty serious precedent for people losing their minds in these kinds of situations. In a previous simulation a male astronaut tried to forcibly kiss one of the female team members! And then the whole thing had to be shut down after it led to a fistfight between the male members that “splattered the walls with bloodâ€. Please tell me they are making this into a reality show – because I just might watch it. Diapered, crazy, horny astronauts from all over the world are locked in a rocket for a year and a half? It’d be like The Jersey Shore for nerds!
[via Popular Science]
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those are so awesome I had never seen more than just the wholphin thanks for the info
Two awesome things in here;
1) I now can answer my students random “Miss, what if *insert animal here* had sex with *insert animal here*?” Grolar Bears FTW!
2) Jurassic Park: The Lost World mentioned stuff about dinosaurs eating soy so they could reproduce… Seemingly this is based on what you have written here? Sci-Fi science fact?
Who knew you were so smart-Beautiful-of course…Your Dad is really rich so buy all the funky animals that you want-he’ll take care of them too…If I get all my friends to read your podcast, will you be able to get advertisers, get rich and send me lots of dough for my dotage…Love, you, Uncle How
I think every male who read that article just breathed a huge sigh of relief that could be heard the world over. Thanks for the additional info, Sarah.
Sorry to scare anyone – the studies I was referring to deal with babies who are on an all soymilk diet (as opposed to breast milk, formula or cow’s milk) and how that affects their development.
Don’t worry – your balls are safe. And so is your prostate (soy consumption in adulthood has been shown to decrease the occurrence of prostate cancer – http://www.springerlink.com/content/q61m05t142208891/ )
I was munching some edamame as I read that these tasty soy beans could be feminizing my manhood.
The effects of phytoestrogens on the body might not be proven and merely speculative, but are you willing to risk it while there’s doubt?
So it was soy….son of a bitch.
Yummy Tang and man-stink. God why can’t I work there and get to be there when they open their suits up??
Thanks for the info on the hybrids. There is also a tiger/lion combo called a tiglon. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiglon
The difference between a tiglon and a liger are the sexes of the two species. A tiglon is a cross between a male tiger and a lioness, while a liger is a male lion/tigress combo. The cool news is that the tiglon can exhibit stripes, but also may inherit spots from the lioness. The photo in that wikipedia article clearly shows the tiglon has stripes. Awesome, eh? Btw, there is a link to a photo of a liger couple down near the bottom of the wiki article. Stripes are faint, but still visible. Tiglon stripes are quite a bit bolder from what I can see. Anyway, just thought I’d add to the hybrid discussion.
In a stupid, nerdy way of thinking, we are all hybrids of our parents…
amazing, and i was thinking the same thing about the Geep, long torso. too long.
i wish ligers where striped like zonkeys
Is it just me or does that goat/sheep seem to have a really long torso? Maybe it’s just the angle & pose. The bear, dolphin & horse hybrids aren’t surprising to me because I heard of em before, and I already knew that llamas & camel’s are related. That cow pic just proves that cows have fat necks.