I’m back, with lots to say, but lots of catching up to do on the day job. Let me first thank Matthew Cobb for a terrific job of filling in. His students get the benefit of his omnivorous readings in the form of a Z (zoology)-letter he sends out weekly, detailing all sorts of interesting animal stuff.
For today, until I shovel myself out from under, I post something for a belated Happy Easter. In WEIT I describe the convergences between marsupial and placental mammals, resemblances that imply that some niches antedate the animals who have evolved to fill them. Although the Australian bilby looks like a rabbit, it isn’t really herbivorous but omnivorous, although it does burrow. There used to be two species, the greater and the lesser bilby (the word “bilby” is aboriginal), but the lesser appears to be extinct. The greater bilby, Macrotis lagotis, is highly endangered due to habitat loss and predation by, among other species, feral cats; you can read about its precarious status here. Only a few hundred remain in the wild. To save the animal, extensive efforts are underway; these include widespread annual sale of chocolate Easter bilbies, which provide revenues for conservation. (In WEIT I mistakenly say “Each spring, chocolate bilbies fill the shelves of Australian supermakets. . .”, and was roundly taken to task by Aussies who pointed out, rightly, that the Australian Easter occurs in the fall.)
So, belatedly, here are some baby bilbies from down under, and the chocolate replicas that are helping save them:
Chocolate bilbies (buy them here):
NB: Goofed again. I am informed that in Australia the penultimate season is called “autumn,” not fall.
I just read this part of your book a couple of days ago.
In Australia easter occurs in Autumn, we use the English name for the season not the American.
In Australia, Autumn is not the penultimate season of the (calendar) year; it is the second.
I am a biblical creationist and must insist that marsupials are indeed just placentals that adapted to Australia or South America etc with a minor reproductive change.
Marsupial dogs, cats, moles, tapirs, bears are just the same creatures as elsewhere with those names.
This is a common theme in the fossil record and many orders of same shaped creatures are said to be unrelated and yet this is wrong classification.
I wrote an essay called “Post Flood marsupial migration Explained” by Robert Byers. Just google.
This whole convergent idea can be seen by creationism as a excellent example of the error of evolutionary teachings.
All the best.
Robert Byers, I wrote an essay “The Christian God is Nothing but an Idea”, so I must insist that you lose. Ha!
I just stumbled upon this site while I was looking at chocolate bilbies. Haha
There is very interesting information here, I think I shall be returning to this site often.
Robert: From this excerpt of your essay, it seems that you have no idea what the definition of the word “evolution” is. I read the essay, you keep defining evolution and using different forms of it as examples as to why changes happened and evolution doesn’t exist. Does that really make sense? Why would you point out how evolution is happening and use THAT as evidence that animals don’t really evolve?
Fossil records show that there used to be dinosaurs. According to the Bible stories, Adam and Eve were created with mammals and such (cows, snakes, fish, lions, etc.) If you go by fossil records that you speak of, you can notice changes in specific species of animals until they become new species. Study Darwin’s theories, they’re very educational and interesting, especially the ones about the Galapagos finches and how one species slowly turned into many as the individual families needed to find other forms of food or face shortages and death or migration. That, my friend, is called evolution. Unless of course dinosaurs exited the Ark along with lions and tigers and bears and crapped out mice and bunnies and marsupials along the way, dying out and leaving humans and modern animals to live on their own……
I found your site just today. I wanted to express how happy I am to find a blog on evolutionary biology that focuses on the science and doesn’t get caught up in bashing Intelligent Design. Even when you deal with the issue, from what I’ve read you have a friendly, helpful tone. That’s what it’ll take if you want to win them over. I am one of the fortunate few IDers who has found his way out of the darkness to wholeheartedly embrace evolution, and did so without having my faith diminished in the least. I expect to turn many times to your blog to expand my knowledge of biology and evolution.
PS- My name’s ironic, isn’t it? I was named after the Second Adam anyway.
That was an excellent essay, Bobby. When will you be graduating elementary school?
Oh, Canada. How the ne’er-mighty have fallen.
I guess it changed their DNA in the same way as well, so that the marsupials cluster together on sequence-based phylogenetic trees. Amazing.
Adelaide Zoo! Hot damn, I saw those very bilbies not long ago on a zoo trip with my girlfriend. Nice to see a reference close to home.
When I was quite young, there was also a campaign which sold stuffed toy bilbies for similar reasons. I had one of these and loved it dearly, despite forever failing to see the link between bilbies and easter.
Obviously you need to visit Australia so we can straighten you out re the local seasons, etc.
Reginald
Since the change would be across the board that the new dna would likewise.
So sameness in dna amongst marsupials and segregation from dna scores with their placental cousins is logical. The scores do not hint at common origins of these creatures as different orders etc.
A wolf is a wolf after all pouch or no pouch.
Incorrect information. The change would not be “across the board.” Evolution and natural selection are simply regional effects as animals adapt to their habitats. It also may not affect animals in the entire area, just some of them that face adaptation or death. Evolution is a form of adaptation, more extreme than most as it results in DNA changes in the animals. If your theory happened to be correct, then when one group of moths had a DNA change that affected their “camo” pattern on their wings, then ALL moths would have that same change, therefor all moths would look the same. Same for wolves, bears, fish, etc. leaving us with one color and shape based appearance for every type of animal there is, including humans. There would only be one race of humans, one breed of wolves, one breed of big cats, etc. You can tell evolution affects groups of animals in specific regions differently due to the fact that there are so many recorded and ever changing creatures all over the planet.