Friday Afternoon Kitty: Halloween Edition!

I think the movie Cat People affected my sexuality forever: two hours of a mostly naked Nastassia Kinski and her incestuous, hooker-eating brother PLUS all those great big black pussycats, all set to David Bowie's soundtrack... Well, it made me into one confused, horny little kitten, let me tell you.

For this Halloween edition of Friday Afternoon Kitty, we present the sexy kissing scene (deep down we know that for adults, Halloween is really about kissing) and the scene where poor Irena turns into a panther for the first time and nearly eats her new boyfriend. Mmmm... miscegenation....

Wednesday Afternoon Critter: Stoner Edition

I so miss the glory days of the National Film Board. The venerable federal institution has over 13,000 films on their site just waiting for you to light up a doobie and hit download. This isn't one of them.

But this one is. Go figure.

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Tuesday Morning Kitty

Who's a bad kitty? You are, yes you are. Did the bad kitty scwatch the twespassers? Yes you did. Who's a good baby, yes you are. (Globe and Mail)

Farewell, "Batty"

Here's an update to this compelling story from yesterday. Last night around 10 o'clock I released "Batty" into the wild. Prairie dog freelancer and fellow Regina Press Club member Carle Steel assisted and documented. I set the shoe-box down on a bench and removed the lid. "Batty" was confused at first but after some wing-stretching he (or she) swooped at my head then flew three loops before spiraling into the night.

Goodbye "Batty" and good luck. You are very cute and everyone will miss you. Except all my co-workers.

There's A Bat On My Building

And he or she is sooo cute! S/he's perched above the door to the salon under prairie dog though, and I'm not sure how the folks at Indira are going to react. I should find a shoebox and try to save this adorable and confused little creature from terrorized hair stylists and manicurists, shouldn't I?

UPDATE: Our little bat friend is secure in a shoebox awaiting release tonight. If anyone has better advice on temporary bat-storage than "taped-shut cardboard box" feel free to post a comment.

Quit Picking On Bats

The Leader Post is reporting on a Regina Qu'Appelle Health region warning about bats. Apparently, the Health Region has received a higher than normal number of reports of bats in houses -- three in the last month!

Seriously? Three? Three bats in houses warrants a health warning?

The reason cited for all the hand wringing is the fear of people somehow contracting rabies from this terrifying, trifoil bat plague.

I've always been a little suspicious of this "bats give you rabies" story so I called up Dr Mark Brigham from the University of Regina's biology department. He's an expert on bats. I asked him if we should be worried about catching rabies from bats.

"No," he says. "Absolutely not. Because the likelihood of a bat having rabies is very low. And 99 per cent of the time, if it does [have rabies], it'll crawl into a corner and die."

"The only way to get rabies [from a bat] is to be bitten. And usually, bats get dumb rabies, not aggressive rabies. So they won't go out of their way to bite people."

He says this annual "bats with rabies" scare is all courtesy of the Old Yeller myth, referring to the Disney film in which a young boy has to shoot his beloved dog because it's rabid and aggressive.

"I hate Walt Disney," says Brigham.

He points to the claim in the Health Region warning that bat bites are small enough that you could get one while sleeping and not know it. Brigham says this is impossible. No adult could sleep through a bat bite.

He notes that the only way to get bitten by a bat is to try to pick one up. So, don't do that and you're safe.

Now, let's say you do -- foolishly -- choose to pick up a bat, and it happens to be one of the few to be infected with rabies, and it bites you, you're still not guaranteed to contract the disease.

And even if you do, he notes that one of the best vaccinations against a virus that medical science has to offer is the one to combat rabies. So getting bitten by a rabid bat is no death sentence. You just get five needles over a number of months and you'll be fine.

As to the question of how many people have died from rabid bats, Brigham says, "To the best of my knowledge, in North America over all of recorded time, so a couple hundred years, maybe 20 to 40 at the maximum. And in Canada, you could easily count them on one hand."

The reason there's an uptick in the number of bat sightings this time of year, says Brigham, is because young bats are just learning to fly and tend to wind up places they'd rather not be. Like our houses.

And, I'd like to add, if we're getting more reports of young bats getting into houses, it's probably a good sign because it means there might be more young bats than usual. And bats are awesome. Bats eat mosquitoes! (Now, mosquitoes. There's a creature that's earned some hate.)

[UPDATE: Double checked the "bats eat mosquitoes" thing with Mark Brigham... Apparently wikipedia lied. (How about that.) Bats in Saskatchewan don't usually eat mosquitoes because they're are too small (mosquitoes are, I mean) and they don't fly around so much. Bats usually eat beetles, moths, midges and caddis flies, etc. And, well, those are all -- moths especially -- pretty disgusting. So I stand by my "bats are awesome" statement.]

So, in short: It's the time year when bats are about. But bats are good and there's no reason to be afraid of them.

Imported Pests, Futile Fences

If you've picked up the new prairie dog, make sure to read Beatty's Top 6 on invasive species (page 5). Point number four is covers the rabbit scourge in West Australia. Since their introduction in the mid-19th century, the bad, bad bunnies have destroyed crops and imperiled native plants and animal species. You can read more here, on the website Rabbit Free Australia.

In the early 20th century, the government built a fence running the length of the country in a failed attempt to contain the horrible hares. Didn't work, but nice try. This link will take you to a photo of Australia's famous Rabbit Proof Fence.

ZOMBIE-ANTS!

Awesome news. Turns out there is a chance armageddon won't be environment or war related. Researchers from the University of Texas have discovered a tiny phorid fly that may be about as bad, pending some massive genetic mutations. The files "dive-bomb" the fire ants and place their eggs inside the unsuspecting bugs. The maggot that hatches inside the ant eats away the ant's brain, and the ant starts exhibiting zombie-like behavior. Eventually their heads fall off, and die. It's just a matter of time for the movie, "Attack of the Zombie-Ants" with Richard Grieco, Erika Eleniak and Gary Busey.

Speaking of Bunnies....

Here's a picture I took of that previously-mentioned, not-afraid hare I saw munching up a storm yesterday. I was maybe five feet away and as you can see s/he wasn't showing me any of that fear bunnies are supposed to have of humans. Smug, cocky bastard.

For more on Wegina wabbits, check out Seema Goel's article in the new prairie dog.

Speaking Of Fish...

Here's video of a, well, National Geographic calls it a, uh, "weird fish with a transparent head".

Click here to go to the National Geographic Web site to see the, erm, fish.

Sneaky Cephalopod

Earlier this week a scheming octopus at the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium opened a valve and flooded the place. From the L.A. Times:

"The tiny octopus, which is about the size of a human forearm when its appendages are extended, floated lazily in the water that remained in its tank. It watched intently through glass walls and portholes as workers struggled to dry the place out in time for the day's first busload of schoolchildren to arrive on a 9:30 a.m. field trip."

Full details here. Octopusses are awesome.

Travel Advisory

As a favour to anyone who may be traveling in the New York area by air in the near future I'm posting this warning that Secretary Michael Chertoff [pictured] of U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued today.

Orange Alert: Recent information has reached this office that an insidious group of terrorists with roots in Canada have begun operating in the New York area. With ruthless efficiency, our sources inform us, they are targeting domestic flights taking off from La Guardia airport on suicide missions that pose tremendous risk to Americans. To combat this threat, our office will be pressing Congress to introduce heightened security measures at all border crossings with Canada, including the possible creation of a series of camoflaged outposts manned by drunken louts equipped with shot-guns. In the meantime, anyone with information on this terrorist cell, which is believed to be headed by an individual with the code name Branta Canadensis , is urged to contact Det. Andy Sipowicz of the New York Police Department immediately. God Bless America.