Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, though it is weird
sometimes – for example, there is a granny of a singer, who is both over 90,
and owns over a dozen of mature and fully-grown lions and tigers, (though not
bears, apparently – somehow, she had missed them).
The good singer is actually half-boasting about that – I am guessing she is
waiting for the mammals to eat the granny and then be acquitted, because they
are, well, animals, and are not really subjected to the American law…and if
they are euthanized or whatever when
the granny gets eaten, it’s no skin off the singer’s nose either – win-win.
What next?
The province of Ontario – during the long weekend – broke all
of the rules of social distancing, yet they still want the borders with U.S.
closed. Imbeciles. This is why I hate other people too, and not just myself.
Ergo, let us talk about the other animals instead – and how about the walrus?
…Yes, we’ve talked about the walrus a long time ago, when we’ve
discussed the AFO episode ‘Polar bear vs. Walrus’ – remember it?.. but first, here
is a shout-out to NatGeo’s latest mini TV-series, ‘Barkskins’, which we’ve
mentioned earlier as well. This is a fairly decent and enjoyable drama, and a
pleasant change from ‘The Wrong Missy’ and ‘The Lovebirds’ that we’ve discussed
earlier.
As for the walrus itself…where to start? The walrus is the
biggest pinniped of the Northern Hemisphere – males can reach up to 4 m in
length and weigh up to 2 metric tons. Despite its physical similarity with the
eared seals, (aka fur seals & sea lions) rather than the true seals, the
walrus is in its own group, not exactly too close to either of the seal groups,
and it is a single species, with two or three subspecies, (scientists are not
sure about the number).
The walruses prefer to live in the shallows of the northern
seas, where they feed on bottom-dwelling sea animals – molluscs, worms,
crustaceans, etc. There are stories about walrus orphans that became full
carnivores, but that evidence is anecdotal, and in the last few decades there
wasn’t any new ones, so that is probably a salty sea tale or whatever.
Once, the walruses lived all over the Arctic waters, living
in herds of hundreds, if not thousands of animals. Now, however, their numbers
have fallen – even with the conservation efforts, the global warming is
affecting them as well as the polar bears, and the walrus females are not that
much more fertile than their polar bear counterparts are – they become sexually
mature only at four to five years of age, and give birth to new pups only every
three to four years. The pups in question grow slowly – for the first two years
they feed only on milk, but during that time, they grow up to 2 m in length and
over 300 kg in weight.
…The walruses supposedly grow until they reach about 20
years of age, and they live for a very long time, if they survived their initial childhood. Humans aside, the only
animals that mess with fully grown walruses are killer whales and polar bears –
and it’s a mixed bag with polar bears, (they prefer to go after walrus pups and
females, not the mature males, and if they can afford it, they go for seals
instead), and as for killer whales… I have not seen much evidence of killer
whale on walrus attacks, so I am guessing that they would rather eat anything
else than a walrus first, especially a mature male one.
Finally, here is a piece of the original fiction about it
instead:
A walrus is a big and heavy beast. It looks like a bag of
blubber, but got plenty of brawn too.
A walrus has two ivory tusks jutting from beneath the
bristly moustache. It got flippers instead of feet, too. A walrus is an aquatic
beast.
A walrus will dive deep and graze on the sea floor like a
cow on a meadow. It eats seaweed and mollusks, and once it is done, the walrus
will emerge, grab an ice floe or the shoreline with its tusks and get out of
the water completely. It will lie down and sleep.
… Well, this is it for now. See you all soon!
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