Via Matthew Cobb by way of Scicurious originally from Laughing Squid, we have a video of a lonely tortoise trying to mate with a shoe (Crocs actually look like the hybrid offspring of a turtle and a sneaker). The enamored reptile periodically emits heartbreaking squeaks.
What animal video could be funnier than that? When the same video is narrated by Sir David Attenborough, as he did on BBC One’s Graham Norton show:
Attenborough could read the phone book and I’d listen in rapture.
Honestly it was cruel to leave out a shoe, because it’s widely known that tortoises can mistake them for mates. You can obviously see the reptile is in pain. All you people laughing are just a bunch of sadists.
If the tortoise was made by a god, one who made the tortoise able to mistake a shoe for a female tortoise, and who also made the tortoise suffer pain as a result of that mistake, I’d say the god is the sadist. Wouldn’t you agree?
I was made in goddys image. That’s all I’m admitting to
That turtle reminds me of our local flightless parrot, Sirocco the Kakapo, who routinely shags peoples heads (I must find a link) In fact if you visit him and he doesn’t even bother trying to shag your head..then that says more about you than it does about him.
Is that squeak a pain cry? I wouldn’t know enough about tortoises to say for sure.
Perhaps the tortoise does not mistake the shoe for a mate, but rather finds it a convenient masturbation aid.
No, it’s not a cry of pain. I was just going along with the creationist, SmoledMan, for the sake of argument. Conceding his uninformed claim just made my argument stronger.
I think the tortoise is just genuinely confused: I’m sure they’re not high brain power animals. And, this one may have been in captivity so long it doesn’t know what a tortoise is, and so just responds to a general shape.
Nah: male turtles are very vocal whenever they have sex. You can find clips of turtles shagging each other, and they make the same goofy sounds
First:
Reblogged this on urbanperegrines.
No, never mind.
Finally!
The best use of a Croc … evah.
I know just how he feels.
Beat me to it.
See what happens when the President endorses gay marriage? The whole natural order collapses.
I think that a lot of you lefty hipsters owe Rick Santorum an apology.
The joys of not owning a TV mean that I don’t have to put up with this (Graham Norton) vapidity and I find it here:-(
If the clip is that vapid why did you take the time to watch it, knowing it was from Norton’s show then take even more time to comment? Sometimes I really don’t understand people.
How far away was the nearest Wal-Mart?
I think this tortoise was just pushing a shopping cart.
Hey, never heard of a foot fetish?
One of the funniest nature clips I ever saw was of two giant tortoises mating on an Attenborough programme. It had me in stitches. I never realised that they do it doggy style and the male was doing a great deal of thrusting and yelping. I couldn’t stop laughing.
On another note, Attenborough is a legend.
Does anyone have a link to an online version of Flanders & Swann’s “Armadillo” duet? Where the narrator (engaged in “taking compass bearings / for the Ordanance Surve-ey”) encounters an armadillo singing a love song to an inappropriate object of it’s affections.
(I have my copy ripped directly from the CD box set. But at nearly 4MB it’s a bit much for casual mailing around).
Part of the lyrics (that should give enough searching clues) :”I was somewhat disconcerted by this curious affair,/
For a single Armadillo, you will own,/
On Salisbury plain, on summer, is comparatively rare,/
And a pair of them is practically unknown.”
I’m moderately surprised that someone at Auntie Beeb didn’t use Swann’s piano theme – but most likely it would have had Attenborough rolling in the aisle helpless with mirth.
You see Attenboroughs reluctant expression as he puts on his glasses, yet he graciously obliges and the resulting narrative is perfect
Attenborough lives round the corner from me. I’ve never seen him about though. Devastating.
Yeah he did look slightly reluctant, despite his brilliant performance.
On a side note, male tortoises are remarkably well-endowed. In fact, some are rather terrifyingly endowed, producing ridged, bloated, purple excresences from twixt their plated decks. They do have to get it in around rather a rather unpliant mate, so it is adaptive, if rather shocking.
The tortoise is not in pain, those are not cries of pain, it’s just what they sound like while humping. Give ’em a break, they don’t have vocal chords to scream out anyone’s name and they lack lips so they can’t do an “O” face. And have a little sympathy. he probably isn’t exposed to many lady tortoises, and really, is it so different to last call at the bar? and if you want to hear some really crazy noises, look up some Galapagos tortoise sex.
Wow – three of my favourite things in one video: Tortoises, tortoise sex, and Attenborough! Thanks for making my day, Jerry.
By the way, I read this post whilst sipping coffee in the research station on Aldabra, ‘surrounded’ by more than 100,000 giant tortoises (bah-humbug, I say, to the mere handfuls of giant tortoises on Galapagos). The males do make quite an impressive sound when mounting a female (or another male). Mating sounds aplenty, and, yes, still funny, even after two months here.
Obviously a foot fetish.
What do the offspring of a croc and a turtle look like? (smiles innocently)
Yeah, I kind of felt sorry for the tortoise…but, other than being lonely and embarrassed, I think he was probably fine… reminds me of a male cat I had and a stuffed animal (siamese cat) that he “cavorted” with and rolled down the stairs entwined…it was funny…but, I realized that he needed a “friend” of the female variety…so, I got him a girlfriend…and they made many loving families….many kittens…and they always lived as a devoted family.