Siona, who is way too kind to me, emailed me a copy of a photo her mother Farland took of something she found floating lifeless in a river while she was kayaking in what looks to be Utah. Out of courtesy to those of you whose stomachs aren’t as strong as PZ’s, I have placed that photo below the fold. The thing is, I can’t for the life of me figure out what the thing is. Ears of a deer and face of a goat, hooves on the front feet and claws on the back… Martian advance scout? Crippled bighorn sheep? Teratoform fetal cow? Chupacabra? You tell me. Swallow hard and look below the fold.
I mean, you know?
As I was saying.
I can see (at this range, on this monitor) that the dark stuff is fur or hair.
Joe sez it’s a jackrabbit—maybe another kind of rabbit, but probably jack. This explains why I kept thinking “goat”—the herbivore skull shape. So I agree.
Pretty sure Joe’s right. I knew it was that size and all, but the “hooves” threw me.
Baby goat. Hence the large ears;
Back legs are a bit of a puzzle, but the corpse needn’t be in pristine condition.
On the other hand;
OK, I’m leaning jackrabbit.
Joe and I had a brief conversation about how we processed this. (Birders have these conversations a lot.)
There’s this cognitive dissonance thing that happens when you see “hooves” and then the right skull shape for herbivore -> ungulate and of course the ears are hanging down (->goat?), OK, processing on course, and then you get to the clearly clawed hind feet and your brain goes “boing.” Cuz there’s no point in either development or decay where hooves resemble claws/toenails with that many digits.
I suppose there’s a sense in which decay reveals development, in some details anyway. It’s more like watching a tree decay and following the flow of the cambium around branch origins and such than like watching a building being torn down, but both bring some palimpsests to light. Some developmental things don’t ever show up again once they’re overgrown, so to speak, but some leave traces that we can learn to read.
I wish my sister Ellen’s former boss, Dr. Maples the medical examiner (and forensic anthropologist) were still around. I always wanted to meet him and talk about such things.
OK.
Now what I want to know about is those rock formations in the background. Speaking of reading histories. Holy cow, what’s going on there?
And as for me, I processed this ID in my usual way, to wit: I asked Joe.
But in hindsight, I can say that the inward fold at the base of the ear should have given it away to me. My house leporid has the same external auricular morphology.
Wow Ron, you used “palimpsests” in a biological context. I don’t think I’ve seen that before. Then again, I don’t read much.
;)
“My house leporid has the same external auricular morphology.”
OK, I’ve just passed my daily quota of fulgent logodaedaly.
One other thing that leads one to think “goat” is the body; it looks too robust for a hare. This could be easily explained by bloating.
Husband says jackrabbit, and the skin is effectively turned inside out and pulled down over the front claws/footpad/whatever. Makes it look like a hoof.
(Either that or a chupacabra.)
He’s an archaeologist, which means when he’s out working he sees a lot of dead animals in the field. Go figure.
I’ll take the easy way out, and throw in a vote for a sign of the impending apocalypse. Any suggestions as to what this new demon species should be named?
Siona, I believe this has been foretold;
http://www.monsterlandtoys.com/video/Night of The Lepus.jpg
Er, something wrong with the pasting; put in the spaces.
Wow. Put “percent sign and 20” in the spaces. I’m not enough of a geek.
Yeah, definitely a rabbit. Too many toes on the hind feet for a goat, and as has already been said, decay isn’t going to that to hooves. The front paws are gloved with skin and fur that has slid down from the forelimbs.
What’s so hard to look at in that picture? It’s fairly clean, not maggoty at all, and the guts haven’t ruptured.
I agree, pz, but I try to accomodate my overly squeamish readers.
Chris is a corpse-free river unto his people. He even provides us with smelling salts and a keyboard vomit guard.
“maggoty”. Ewww.
I can name that corpse in two words: Borty Beelzebub.
mroberts? I nearly hurt myself laughing at that one.
mroberts, I’ve been called much worse, and since we’ve already had Lawrence of Arabia, why not Caddyshack?