Gordon Grice's Blog, page 62

Grice Speaks at the University of St. Thomas

Here's a brief news video about a talk I gave last week at the University of St. Thomas:


Thanks to Matt and Liz for inviting me and to the enthusiastic audience, who had great questions. 

Mantis vs. Mouse

If you've read The Red Hourglass, you already know how this is going to turn out. . . .

Coming Soon to the UK

Warning: The slightly re-titled paperback edition of The Book of Deadly Animals attacks the United Kingdom April 5. 

Wildlife Classics: American Buffalo

by Washington Irving
We emerged towards mid-day from the dreary belt of the CrossTimber, and to our infinite delight beheld "the great Prairie "stretching to the right and left before us. We could distinctly trace themeandering course of the Main Canadian, and various smaller streams by thestrips of green forest that bordered :them. The landscape was vast andbeautiful. There is always an expansion of feeling in looking upon theseboundless and fertile wastes; but I was doubly conscious of it after emergingfrom our "close dungeon of innumerable boughs."
From a rising ground Beatte pointed out to the place wherehe and his comrades had killed the buffaloes; and we beheld several blackobjects moving in the distance, which he said were part of the herd. TheCaptain determined to shape his course to a woody bottom about a mile distantand to encamp there, for a day or two, by way of having a regular buffalo hunt,and getting a supply of provisions. As the troop defiled along the slope of thehill towards the camping ground, Beatte proposed to my messmates and myself,that we should put ourselves under his guidance, promising to take us where weshould have plenty of sport. Leaving the line of march, therefore, we divergedtowards the prairie; traversing a small valley, and ascending a gentle swell ofland. As we reached the summit, we beheld a gang of wild horses about a mileoff. Beatte was immediately on the alert, and no longer thought of buffalohunting. He was mounted on his powerful half-wild horse, with a lariat coiledat the saddle bow and set off in pursuit; while we remained on a rising groundwatching his maneuvres with great solicitude. Taking advantage of a strip ofwoodland, he stole quietly along, so as to get close to them before he wasperceived. The moment they caught sight of him a grand scamper took place. Wewatched him skirting along the horizon like a privateer in full chase of amerchantman; at length he passed over the brow of a ridge, and down into ashallow valley; in a few moments he was on the opposite hill and close upon oneof the horses. He was soon head and head; and appeared to be trying to noosehis prey; but they both disappeared again below the hill, and we saw no more·of them. It turned out afterwards, that he had noosed a powerful horse, butcould not hold him, and had lost his lariat in the attempt.
While we were waiting for his return, we perceived twobuffalo bulls descending a slope, towards a stream, which wound through aravine fringed with trees. The young Count and myself endeavoured to get nearthem under covert of the trees. They discovered us while we were yet three orfour hundred yards off, and turning about, retreated up the rising ground; Weurged our horses across the ravine, and gave chase. The immense weight of headand shoulders causes the buffalo to labour heavily up hill; but it accelerateshis descent. We had the advantage, therefore, and gained rapidly upon thefugitives, though it was difficult to get our horses to approach them, theirvery scent inspiring them with terror. The Count, who had a double barrelledgun loaded with ball, fired, but missed. The bulls now altered their course,and galloped down hill with headlong rapidity. As they ran in differentdirections, we each singled one and separated. I was provided with a brace ofveteran brass barrelled pistols, which I had borrowed at Fort Gibson, and whichhad evidently seen some service. Pistols are very effective in buffalo hunting,as the hunter can ride up close to the animal, and fire at it while at fullspeed; whereas the long heavy rifles used on the frontier, cannot be easilymanaged, nor discharged with accurate aim from horseback. My object, therefore,was to get within pistol shot of the buffalo. This was no very easy matter. Iwas well mounted on a horse of excellent speed and bottom, that seemed eagerfor the chase, and soon overtook the game; but the moment he came nearlyparallel, he would keep sheering off with ears forked, and pricked forward, andevery symptom of aversion and alarm. It was no wonder. Of all animals, abuffalo, when close pressed by the hunter, has an aspect the most diabolical.His two short black horns, curve out of a huge frontlet of shaggy hair; hiseyes glow like coals; his mouth is open, his tongue parched and drawn up into ahalf crescent; his tail is erect, and tufted and whisking about in the air, heis a perfect picture of mingled rage and terror.
It was with difficulty I urged my horse sufficiently near,when, taking aim, to my chagrin, both pistols missed fire. Unfortunately thelocks of these veteran weapons were so much worn, that in the gallop, thepriming had been shaken out of the pans. At the snapping of the last pistol Iwas close upon the buffalo, when, in his despair, he turned round with a suddensnort and rushed upon me. My horse wheeled about as if on a pivot, made aconvulsive spring, and, as I had been leaning on one side with pistol extended,I came near being thrown at the feet of the buffalo.
Three or four bounds of the horse carried us out of thereach of the enemy; who, having merely turned in desperate self defence,quickly resumed his flight. As soon as I could gather in my panic-strickenhorse, and prime the pistols afresh, I again spurred in pursuit of the buffalo,who had slackened his speed to take breath. On my approach he again set offfull tilt, heaving himself forward with a heavy rolling gallop, dashing withheadlong precipitation through brakes and ravines, while several deer andwolves, startled from their coverts by his thundering career, ran helterskelter to right and left across the waste.
A gallop across the prairies in pursuit of game, is by nomeans so smooth a career as those may imagine, who have only the idea of anopen level plain. It is true, the prairies of the hunting ground are not somuch entangled with flowering plants and long herbage as the lower prairies,and are principally covered with short buffalo grass; but they are diversifiedby hill and dale, and where most level, are apt to be cut up by deep rifts andravines, made by torrents after rains; and which, yawning from an even surfaceare almost like pitfalls in the way of the hunter, checking him suddenly, whenin full career, or subjecting him to the risk of limb and life. The plains,too, are beset by burrowing holes of small animals, in which the horse is aptto sink to the fetlock, and throw both himself and his rider. The late rain hadcovered some parts of the prairie, where the ground was hard, with a thin sheetof water, through which the horse had to splash his way. In other parts therewere innumerable shallow hollows, eight or ten feet in diameter, made by thebuffaloes, who wallow in sand and mud like swine. These being filled withwater, shone like mirrors, so that the horse was continually leaping over themor springing on one side. We had reached, too, a rough part of the prairie,very much broken and cut up; the buffalo, who was running for life, took noheed to his course, plunging down breakneck ravines, where it was necessary toskirt the borders in search of a safer descent. At length we came to where awinter stream had torn a deep chasm across the whole prairie, leaving openjagged rocks, and forming a long glen bordered by steep crumbling cliffs ofmingled stone and clay. Down one of these the buffalo flung himself, halftumbling, half leaping, and then scuttled along the bottom; while I, seeing allfurther pursuit useless, pulled up, and gazed quietly after him from the borderof the cliff, until he disappeared amidst the windings of the ravine.
Nothing now remained but to turn my steed and rejoin mycompanions. Here at first was some little difficulty. The ardour of the chasehad betrayed me into a long, heedless gallop. I now found myself in the midstof a lonely waste, in which the prospect was bounded by undulating swells of land,naked and uniform, where, from the deficiency of landmarks and distinctfeatures, an inexperienced man may become bewildered, and lose his way asreadily as in the wastes of the ocean. The day too, was overcast, so that Icould not guide myself by the sun; my only mode was to retrace the track myhorse had made in coming, though this I would often lose sight of, where theground was covered with parched herbage.
To one unaccustomed to it, there is something inexpressiblylonely in the solitude of a prairie. The loneliness of a forest seems nothingto it. There the view is shut in by trees, and the imagination is left free topicture some livelier scene beyond. But here we have an immense extent oflandscape without a sign of human existence. We have the consciousness of beingfar, far beyond the bounds of human habitation; we feel as if moving in themidst of a desert world. As my horse lagged slowly back over the scenes of ourlate scamper, and the delirium of the chase had passed away, I was peculiarly sensibleto these circumstances. The silence of the waste was now and then broken by thecry of a distant flock of pelicans, stalking like spectres about a shallowpool; sometimes by the sinister croaking of a raven in the air, whileoccasionally a scoundrel wolf would scour off from before me; and, havingattained a safe distance, would sit down and howl and wine with tones that gavea dreariness to the surrounding solitude.
After pursuing my way for some time, I descried a horsemanon the edge of a distant hill, and soon recognised him to be the Count. He hadbeen equally unsuccessful with myself; we were shortly afterwards rejoined byour worthy comrade, the Virtuoso, who, with spectacles on nose, had made two orthree ineffectual shots from horseback.
We determined not to seek the camp until we had made onemore effort. Casting our eyes about the surrounding waste, we descried a herdof buffalo about two miles distant, scattered apart, and quietly grazing near asmall strip of trees and bushes. It required but little stretch of fancy topicture them so many cattle grazing on the edge of a common, and that the grovemight shelter some lowly farm house.
We now formed our plan to circumvent the herd, and bygetting on the other side of them to hunt them in the direction where we knewour camp to be situated: otherwise, the pursuit might take us to such adistance as to render it impossible for us to find our way back before nightfall.Taking a wide circuit therefore, we moved slowly and cautiously, pausingoccasionally, when we saw any of the herd desist from grazing. The windfortunately set from them, otherwise they might have scented us and have takenthe alarm. In this way, we succeeded in getting round the herd withoutdisturbing it. It consisted of about forty head, bulls, cows and calves.Separating to some distance from each other, we now approached slowly in aparallel line, hoping by degrees to steal near without exciting attention. Theybegan, however, to move off quietly, stopping at every step or two to graze,when suddenly a bull that, unobserved by us, had been taking his siesta under aclump of trees to our left, roused himself from his lair, and hastened to joinhis companions. We were still at a considerable distance, but the game hadtaken the alarm. We quickened our pace, they broke into a gallop, and nowcommenced a full chase.
As the ground was level, they shouldered along with greatspeed, following each other in a line; two or three bulls bringing up the rear,the last of whom, from his enormous size and venerable frontlet, and beard ofsunburnt hair, looked like the patriarch of the herd; and as if he might longhave reigned the monarch of the prairie.
There is a mixture of the awful and the comic in the look ofthese huge animals, as they bear their great bulk forwards, with an up and downmotion of the unwieldy head and shoulders; their tail cocked up like the queueof pantaloon in a pantomine, the end whisking about in a fierce yet whimsicalstyle, and their eyes glaring venomously with an expression of fright and fury.
For some time I kept parallel with the line, without beingable to force my horse within pistol shot, so much had he been alarmed by theassault of the buffalo, in the preceding chase. At length I succeeded, but wasagain balked by my pistols missing fire. My companions, whose horses were lessfleet, and more way-worn, could not overtake the herd; at length Mr. L. who wasin the rear of the line, and losing ground, levelled his double barrelled gun,and fired a long raking shot. It struck a buffalo just above the loins, brokeits back bone, and brought it to the ground. He stopped and alighted todespatch his prey, when borrowing his gun which had yet a charge remaining init, I put my horse to his speed, again overtook the herd which was thunderingalong, pursued by the Count. With my present weapon there was no need of urgingmy horse to such close quarters; galloping along parallel, therefore, I singledout a buffalo, and by a fortunate shot brought it down on the spot. The ballhad struck a vital part; it would not move from the place where it fell, butlay there struggling in mortal agony, while the rest of the herd kept on theirheadlong career across the prairie.
Dismounting, I now fettered my horse to prevent hisstraying, and advanced to contemplate my victim. I am nothing of a sportsman: Ihad been prompted to this unwonted exploit by the magnitude of the game, andthe excitement of an adventurous chase. Now that the excitement was over Icould not but look with commiseration upon the poor animal that lay strugglingand bleeding at my feet. His very size and importance, which had beforeinspired me with eagerness, now increased my compunction. It seemed as if I hadinflicted pain in proportion to the bulk of my victim, and as if there were ahundred fold greater waste of life than there would have been in thedestruction of an animal of inferior size. To add to these after qualms ofconscience, the poor animal lingered in his agony. He had evidently received amortal wound, but death might be long in coming. It would not do to leave himhere to be torn piecemeal, while yet alive, by the wolves that had alreadysnuffed his blood, and were skulking and howling at a distance, and waiting formy departure, and by the ravens that were flapping about, croaking dismally inthe air. It became now an act of mercy to give him his quietus, and put him outof his misery. I primed one of the pistols, therefore, and advanced close up tothe buffalo. To inflict a wound thus in cool blood, I found a totally differentthing from firing in the heat of the chase. Taking aim, however, just behindthe foreshoulder, my pistol for once proved true; the ball must have passedthrough the heart, for the animal gave one convulsive three and expired.
While I stood meditating and moralizing over the wreck I hadso wantonly produced, with my horse grazing near me, I was rejoined by myfellow sportsman, the Virtuoso; who, being a man of universal adroitness, andwithal, more experienced and hardened in the gentle art of "venerie,"soon managed to carve out the tongue of the buffalo, and delivered it to me tobear back to the camp as a trophy.
from A Tour of the Prairies, published in 1835.

New Discovery: Bears Use Tools

A brown bear was spotted and photographed using a rock to scrub itself. 

BBC Nature - Brown bear exfoliates using rock as a tool:
"The finding makes bears the fifth non-primate mammal known to make use of tools.

Sea otters use rocks to smash the shells of sea urchins and clams, Asian elephants have been witnessed using tree branches to swat flies, some bottlenose dolphins use sponges to cover their rostrum while foraging and humpback whales have been known to make use of bubbles to help them trap groups of fish."

Why is this a big deal? Because tools used to be regarded as one of the main markers of humanity. Using them has been seen as a symptom of that ill-defined quality, intelligence. 


Discoveries in recent years have steadily increased membership in the tool club. Besides the mammals listed above, we have anecdotal reports of raccoons using rocks to smash crayfish. Some birds have been proved to use tools--for example, the crows use blades of grass to probe for insects. Bernd Heinrich even witnessed a wasp using a twig to tamp mud. My guess is that there's a lot more intelligence on this planet than we ever suspected.

Hawk in a Bird Bath

Not your average visitor to the bird bath: Dee spotted this hawk in her neighbor's yard. She says it's probably a red-tailed hawk, though she didn't get a good look at the underside of its wings -- that would have helped her feel sure it wasn't the similar red-shouldered hawk. 






Photography by Dee Puett

Animal Attack Movies: Tarzan and His Mate

Animal Attack Quotient: Highest of all movies. This one features lions attacking people, rhinos attacking chimps, elephants squishing lions, a demented scene of a crocodile doing its death roll, ants eating a dead guy, a near-miss with a python, cannibal attacks, and much more.   


Cheese Factor: Well, you've got an army of guys in gorilla suits, plus a big dose of nutty 1930s racism. And that's before you even meet "the Lord of the Jungle."

Cockroach Defends Somebody Else's Kids

This is the sort of behavior I associate with mammals, but here it is in an insect. One cockroach gives birth; another female defends the young. 

Ant on Flower

Photography by D'Arcy Allison-Teasley

Ants Inside a Morning Glory

International Ant Week continues with D'Arcy's morning-glorious photos.




Tomorrow, Ant Week concludes with another inside look at nectar-gathering ants. 

Photography by D'Arcy Allison-Teasley