Wednesday, November 26, 2008

They're Not Really Polar Opposites

Apparently, zookeepers in Japan have a difficult time RECOGNIZING THE GENDER of their polar bears. After all, they are rather furry creatures. It wasn't until 4 months after the two were brought together to mate that zookeepers became suspicious that the scheduled mating would not lead to anything fruitful:
"[O]ne day we realized that the two bears urinate in the same way, and we thought, is that how males do it? And once we started to look at things that way, we weren't quite so sure."
Wow. And these are the professionals? Apparently zoology 101 isn't quite so difficult to pass after all. But what peaks my curiosity the most is whether the manual inspection or the DNA tests came first. Surely it's not an easy task to manually inspect a polar bear for anything.

They are currently seeking an annulment for the bears citing the realities of a poorly thought out arranged marriage. Until then, they are living a Josephite marriage.

2 comments:

arowbee said...

"peaks" vs. "piques"

Can you look into this for me? I think you're using the wrong word because I think you mean to say that your interest was pricked/stimulated. Maybe you mean your interest came to a point or was heightened.

The Vitruvian Duck said...

Peaks: My interest has reached as high as it can go, and can go no higher. This says nothing of the actual level of interest objectively, but only subjectively.

Piques: My interest has just begun and has very great upward mobility. Both objectively and subjectively my interest/curiosity is being increased.

I stand by my choice.