Eeeew!
on 12/17/2009 at 05:02 PM
Factoid back to you - each claw of a lion is as long as a human finger!
Birds also have no separate urinary system—“urine” gets mixed with other waste. Something you may have noticed when they crap on your windshield.
Nice factoid on the shark, by the way.
The birdy one I knew. They have this universal orifice called a cloaca. Lay eggs through there too. But pee in the blood in the sharks? That’s weird.
That explains the shark smell. I know people who eat shark. Cue my ‘yuck’ factor.
The shark factoid only applies to a sub-species called Chondrichthyes Nomen Bobinious - or Sharks Named Bob.
Actually Corsair, Chondrichthyes is their class, which includes rays. Elasmobranchii is the general order for sharks, or at least it used to be. Now it’s called a subclass, and there are now 8 or more subclasses and a few superorders. Taxonomy - biologic classification - has become a mess at the low levels; old Linnaeus’ simple “Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species” is getting blurry at the fractal end.
But if I ever run across a shark named Bob, I’ll be sure to wipe my hands afterwards.
A related sub-class factoid: putting lifeforms in categories is the practice of cladistics. Taxonomic groups are thus called clades. If groups (plural) are called clades, then one group is “clade”, derived from the Greek “klados” which means branch. An excellent Scrabble word, guaranteed to send your (non-biologist) opponent into Challenge Mode, which you will win. 20 points IIRC.
Im never gonna take anyone up on an offer for shark or shark fin soup again,Thanks a lot!
