Never smile at a crocodile
They tell you never to work with children or animals, especially if you're on some sort of government register. They don't warn animals, though, about working with Beyonce.

Maybe they should.

Before she'd allow herself to be photographed with an alligator for the cover of BDay, she insisted they tape the animal's mouth shut. Which makes you wonder why they bother at all - if the idea is to show Beyonce facing down danger, then at least let the animal have a bit of a yawn. Having your photo taken with a crocodile which can't bite is about as dangerous as doing a duet with Marilyn Manson.

Source: Musicrooms

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 6:54 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
No wonder he can turn his head right round
Harley the owl has just seen his partner Loveness (also an owl) give birth to their 28th batch of owlets at a cracking owl sanctuary in Newquay.

Source: Daily Mirror

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 8:41 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Kangalooe
There's been no reports of an escape from a zoo or an animal park, but holidaymakers in Looe are insisting they've seen a kangaroo hanging about the beach.

Source: The Sun

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 9:47 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
More unfinished monkey business
The builders turned up at Knowsley Safari Park to set about building a new baboon house.

Trouble is, the baboons didn't want to move out their old house.

Safari Park general manager David Ross admitted the baboons are not happy about losing their `home, sweet home'.

He said: "The problem with animals is that you can't consult with them and tell them that they'll have new deluxe accommodation within a few weeks.

"We just had to go in and demolish the building to make way for the new structure, although the work was specifically scheduled for high summer when baboons prefer to sleep outside in the trees.

"As soon as they saw what was happening the troop got very agitated and I could hear them barking and chattering all through the night. However, we hope they will settle down and approve of their new `des res', complete with electricity and water, when it is completed in the near future."

Source: Liverpool Echo

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 4:31 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Monkey business
Spider monkeys in Regent's Park Zoo have found a secret hole which is allowing them to get out of their cage and into the trees. Two have applied for work at a local Cafe Nero.

Source: Daily Mirror

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 8:38 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Rover on rails
For reasons we can't quite figure out, somebody has built a monorail to allow their dogs to travel round their garden. And we thought the steps for dogs to get on sofas was over-pampering pooches.

Source: The Monorail Organisation

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 1:59 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Dog bites bird
A vicar's budgie, Troy, has survived being eaten by the vicar's dog, Whiskey. The vicar is now thinking of renaming the bird Lazarus, after the second-most famous person in the Bible who came back to life.

Source: Daily Record

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 8:33 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Dogs the first casualty of the "war" on drugs
Some disturbing evidence from the US that the hysteria-driven SWAT teams seeking out drugs take a pretty cheap view of life:

the image that sticks in your head, as described by John Dougherty in the alternative weekly Phoenix New Times, is that of a puppy trying to escape the fire and a SWAT officer chasing him back into the burning building with puffs from a fire extinguisher. The dog burned to death.

In a massive 1998 raid at a San Francisco housing co-op, cops shot a family dog in front of its family, then dragged it outside and shot it again.

When police in Fremont, California, raided the home of medical marijuana patient Robert Filgo, they shot his pet Akita nine times. Filgo himself was never charged.

Last October police in Alabama raided a home on suspicion of marijuana possession, shot and killed both family dogs, then joked about the kill in front of the family. They seized eight grams of marijuana, equal in weight to a ketchup packet.

In January a cop en route to a drug raid in Tampa, Florida, took a short cut across a neighboring lawn and shot the neighbor’s two pooches on his way.

And last May, an officer in Syracuse, New York, squeezed off several shots at a family dog during a drug raid, one of which ricocheted and struck a 13-year-old boy in the leg. The boy was handcuffed at gunpoint at the time.

To be honest, I'd be happier living in a land where potsmokers could quietly go about their business than I would be one where police shoot animals for kicks.

Source: Cato Institute

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 1:48 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Pizza and scorpions are not part of a balanced diet
Meerkat babies learn what to eat - and what not to eat - through "feeding lessons" from their parents. The only other animal which does this? It's us, apparently.

Source: BBC News report of an article in Science

[Plug: Meerkat photobook]

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 7:43 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Enormous cats
No matter how many senior Labour party figures get arrested, there's always room in the papers for stories about enormous cats. In this case, Garfield, a stray who somehow managed to reach one stone in weight while living on the streets of Durham.

Source: The Sun

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 7:59 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Monkey love
A couple who were fighting for custody of their pet monkey are now being investigated as police think the simian might have been stolen from a zoo in the first place.

Source: Sunday Mirror

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 1:56 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Pooches pinched
Perhaps we should treat with a slight degree of caution the claims that "520 cats and dogs are stolen every day" in the UK, coming as they do from an insurance company which offers pet insurance.

That would be nearly 200,000 animals disappearing every year - how many coats does Cruella need, exactly?

The Missing Pet Bureau advises you "never leave your dog unattended", which we guess means you might need to get a guard dog to watch your guard dog.

Source: Sunday Mirror

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 1:50 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Will the bears be on display?
London Zoo is holding its first gay-themed day, inviting gay celebrities (and, apparently, David Walliams on the grounds that he's camp, so that's near enough), debating homosexuality in the animal kingdom.

Organiser Joanna Green said: "This is a day dedicated to the gay community and hopefully it will go down a storm. It will be fun, educational and, of course, very, very camp.

"A walk through our tropical butterfly tunnel will add a romantic touch to the day. But people can also come face-to-face with African hunting dogs and a giraffe.

"We have 650 species of animal at the zoo, many of which are highly endangered.

"This day is all about celebrating gay culture and encouraging conservation.

"There will be a discussion from gay organisations and wildlife experts, debating homosexuality within the animal kingdom."

We love the way Joanna suddenly realised that talking about butterflies might be considered stereotyping gay people and so she attempted to throw in the least flighty, limp-wristed creatures she could think of, coming up with "a giraffe."

[Plug: Homosexual Behaviour in Animals, a new academic study of what animals get up if there's nobody yelling at them that "it ain't bloody natural and it ain't going on in my cage."]
Source: Sunday Mirror

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 1:39 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Night on the reptiles
Lizards behaving like cats: Igor the iguana got out of an attic window, and ended up stuck on the roof. Eventually the RSPCA came out and rescued him.

Source: The People

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 2:09 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Football does something good
There are so many miserable animals trapped in the "entertainment" industry, and so we guess the lions which the Sunday Mirror and Born Free are campaigning to free are lucky that there's three of them stuck in their piss-soaked, tiny cages. That means they can be built into a World Cup themed Three Lions type rallying call, see?

Source: Sunday Mirror

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 1:47 PM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |

 
Could I see your snake licence, sir?
Released and escaped Burmese pythons are proving such a problem in Florida that they're planning to add them to the list of the State's controlled reptiles. That would mean if you want to own one in Orlando, you'd need to complete a course and hold a licence.

Source: ABC News

- posted by Simon Hayes Budgen- 11:57 AM - permanent link to this post - click the envelope to email to a friend:

0 comments - click to add yours |