The rabbit occupies an unusual position in the animal kingdom. Some people keep pet sheep, cows or chickens. Some people eat guinea pigs and dogs. But only the rabbit enjoys widespread popularity as companion and comestible. I’m quite lucky in […]

neoteny n. The retention of juvenile characteristics in the adults of a species
Such as being amused by nob gags? I suspect not. The film Team America: World Police is packed with juvenile humour – it appealled only to the base, the vulgar, tho[…]

Alix writes:
Narwhals are rarely seen and their lifestyle is poorly documented. They live in the Arctic but churlishly avoid Siberia and Alaska. Their most distinctive feature is their ridiculous tusk. Only the males have this tusk (females being too[…]

The pig is one of the most versatile animals in the kitchen (pork, sausage, bacon, scratchings, ears, trotters, rilettes, belly, all manner of fat-based goodness) and for this alone we love it. But its uses in rhetoric are almost as broad.
Greed is t[…]

Top? What does that mean? Cutest? Best in a fight? Most legs? Apparently our scientific method needs nothing as impecunious as a yardstick – these animals are top. That’s all you need to know.
Perhaps the absence of criteria hides a mess […]