First, I'll start with a super cool animal fact I recently learned.
I'm reading this book called Dark Banquet by Bill Schutt about blood-feeding animals. I'm not too big a fan of his writing style, but I do love the crazy information on Vampire Bats, Leaches(ew.), and other animals. The info on blood-suckingers is, of course, very interesting (I'll probably write a post about that once I finish the book), but a quick tid-bit of info on Panda's is what really amazed me.
It was known for a long time that panda's have opposable thumbs that it uses to grasp bamboo stalks and rip leaves off and things like that. This alone was odd, given that we like to tout opposable thumbs as a sign of a higher form of evolution and human success. But, what's even more strange about panda hands is that they have 5 fingers in addition to their thumb.
This lead anatomists to research and discover that the panda's thumb was not a finger at all, but actually an extension of a section of it's wrist bone that was so enlarged it ended up looking and functioning like a thumb. Which...is crazy!
The science world took notice to this discovery in an awesome essay by Stephen Jay Gould where he describes this quirky bone arrangement as "familiar bits of anatomy remodeled for a new function". Even the muscles around the "thumb" are actually wrist muscles that just slightly adjusted their function to move more like the finger muscles. Gould argues that "odd arrangements and funny solutions are the proof of evolution".
So. Incredibly. Awesome. I haven't stopped thinking about the panda thumb since I read this like a week ago...this just may be my #1 Favorite Animal Fact of the Month. Congrats Pandas! You Win!
On an artsy note, I got my new business cards in the mail!! Check it out!
I'm reading this book called Dark Banquet by Bill Schutt about blood-feeding animals. I'm not too big a fan of his writing style, but I do love the crazy information on Vampire Bats, Leaches(ew.), and other animals. The info on blood-suckingers is, of course, very interesting (I'll probably write a post about that once I finish the book), but a quick tid-bit of info on Panda's is what really amazed me.
It was known for a long time that panda's have opposable thumbs that it uses to grasp bamboo stalks and rip leaves off and things like that. This alone was odd, given that we like to tout opposable thumbs as a sign of a higher form of evolution and human success. But, what's even more strange about panda hands is that they have 5 fingers in addition to their thumb.
This lead anatomists to research and discover that the panda's thumb was not a finger at all, but actually an extension of a section of it's wrist bone that was so enlarged it ended up looking and functioning like a thumb. Which...is crazy!
The science world took notice to this discovery in an awesome essay by Stephen Jay Gould where he describes this quirky bone arrangement as "familiar bits of anatomy remodeled for a new function". Even the muscles around the "thumb" are actually wrist muscles that just slightly adjusted their function to move more like the finger muscles. Gould argues that "odd arrangements and funny solutions are the proof of evolution".
So. Incredibly. Awesome. I haven't stopped thinking about the panda thumb since I read this like a week ago...this just may be my #1 Favorite Animal Fact of the Month. Congrats Pandas! You Win!
On an artsy note, I got my new business cards in the mail!! Check it out!
Super special thanks to Corey for designing them for me. Thank youuuuu!
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